‘One Life Many’: Sudarshan Shetty’s exhibition redefines reality with everyday objects

One Life Many, an exhibition by Sudarshan Shetty, was held in collaboration with GALLERYSKE at IFBE, Ballard Estate, Mumbai recently. (Image credits: Courtesy of GALLERYSKE and Sudarshan Shetty; Photographs by Subhash Jadhav)

It presents Shetty’s film premiere in India, accompanied by thought-provoking assemblages. These pieces encourage audiences to explore the blurred lines between reality and illusion in daily life. (Image credits: Courtesy of GALLERYSKE and Sudarshan Shetty; Photographs by Subhash Jadhav)

Juxtaposing cinema and tangible media forms, the exhibition recasts everyday objects like telephones and typewriters, creating a theatre of daily life. (Image credits: Courtesy of GALLERYSKE and Sudarshan Shetty; Photographs by Subhash Jadhav)

'One Life Many' examines modern memory-making spaces -- theatre, museum, and cinema -- through assemblages of object bodies, serving as portals to question the real and the illusory, and the role objects play as evidence or appendages to the self. (Image credits: Courtesy of GALLERYSKE and Sudarshan Shetty; Photographs by Subhash Jadhav)

By linking cinema, theatre, and museum, the show establishes a unique space between real, surreal, and hyperreal. (Image credits: Courtesy of GALLERYSKE and Sudarshan Shetty; Photographs by Subhash Jadhav)

In a conflicted world where identity is a key political asset, the artist takes an oblique approach. (Image credits: Courtesy of GALLERYSKE and Sudarshan Shetty; Photographs by Subhash Jadhav)

The resonant words of renowned Indian musician Pandit Kumar Gandharva, "We are individually multiple," serve as a crucial reference for the artist. (Image credits: Courtesy of GALLERYSKE and Sudarshan Shetty; Photographs by Subhash Jadhav)

Talking about his work, Shetty says, "The seed of this exhibition lies in a folk story that I heard a long time ago, which comes together in a video and a suite of objects to be viewed in a specific order of display -- a way of retelling the story in as many ways as possible. Retelling is the lifeblood of oral traditions, ensuring a sense of community and recalling wisdom that has evolved through centuries. How else can we make sense of our present?" (Image credits: Courtesy of GALLERYSKE and Sudarshan Shetty; Photographs by Subhash Jadhav)

He adds: In my role as an artist, I would like to see my work as a mediation between how I am conditioned to belong in a structure dictated by Western canons and a life as I perceive it from where I belong, outside of it. (Image credits: Courtesy of GALLERYSKE and Sudarshan Shetty; Photographs by Subhash Jadhav)