Originally conceived and commissioned on occasion of Sharjah Biennial 2017, Vikram Divecha’s long-term project Beej, the Urdu word for seed, activates the potential for agricultural farming within the municipal workforce of Sharjah, predominantly labourers from Pakistan, who tend to Sharjah’s urban landscaping. In doing so, the artist had requested two gardeners to travel home to bring vegetable and grain seeds from their family farms in Lahore and Punjab. Along with others in the community, they sowed the seeds within a roundabout, a site of convening and dispersal hosting the cycles of sowing and harvesting, in the Al Naba’ah residential neighbourhood of Sharjah. This project is supported by Sharjah Municipality and Maraya Art Centre.
7 April 2019
