Site specific art workshop
Partapur
Banswara district​
Rajasthan ​
November 2005
The workshop took place in a small town of partapur where the village named ‘bori ‘ is situated. The name ‘bori’ is recent and was given to the village by the local king after the village gave the king the maximum boris[sacks] of grain as tax. The earlier name of the village was ‘pharta kuan’. According to the local government and land records there are 93 functional wells in the village to a population of 3200 people.
My attempt was to rename the village for its water abundance, ‘pharta’ means wherever and’ kuan’ means well, so the village is known for its abundance of ground water and wells. Some of which are step well and are 350 years old.
I took a direct cast of a recently styled bucket and a mug, which is used for all kinds of ablutions. The cast was made from sand from the local River and white cement. The two casts were then taken around to most of the wells and water bodies of the village and photographed, a kind of documentation of the natural water bodies and their present condition. The attempt was to foreground natural ways of water harvesting, preservation of natural water sources and question reliance on piped water, which though promised, but is rarely delivered. The presentation was made at the local market for people to come and interact and see some sites they had forgotten about.