Museum in a box

Dayanita Singh, an artist and curator gives photography a new art form

As one enters Dayanita Singh’s home in Vasant Vihar, New Delhi, two empty wooden structures, situated in the living room, catch the eye. Covered in cloth, they look enshrouded, waiting to reveal their mysteries at an opportune time.

This visual unlocks other memories, taking one back to 2015 when similar wooden structures stood in a labyrinthine maze at the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, New Delhi. “Museum Bhavan”, Singh had called this collection of memories, born out of years of ruthless editing, sequencing and archiving of images, which she had scattered across nine wooden structures. Each structure had a name: