Dancing in the Pipal
Pavan Singh Sidhu
M Arch: Architecture, Central Saint Martins
The Pipal tree is the centre of social life in the Punjabi village, holding space for community and storytelling. These trees are said to be home to spirits who dance among the leaves. My dance explores the way South Asian community space forms in different ways in the diaspora with clusters of chosen families. This is interpreted as a canopy filled with fairies - the spirits flowing through the dancing leaves of the Pipal tree in the displaced village.
Artist Statement:
As a Sikh queer Punjabi-British spatial practitioner, I explore the complex intersections of my personal ‘marginalities’ with space, place, and culture. Through my work, I engage in a self-referential exploration of the space I inhabit, documenting its nuances and proposing new futures.
My artistic inquiry challenges prevailing narratives that treat being Desi and being queer as mutually exclusive, I affirm alternative perspectives that challenge such reductive compartmentalisation. Working collaboratively to challenge understandings of identity, belonging, and spirituality, to add to the discourse through playful exploration.
I often involve the use of my body as a tactile vessel, allowing me to engage with space on a deeply intimate and ephemeral level. Through this embodied exploration, I aim to blur the boundaries between the physical and the conceptual, inviting others to also reconsider their own relationship with space and identity. My work spans many mediums as a constant exploration of my self-perception and as a form of self-fashioning.