Dargah-e-Ayenaah

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Invitation card for Dargah-e-Ayenaah
The idea of Dargah-e-Ayenaah started building up in my mind because of my spiritual journey during the last two years and some sort of extension of my previous work "We Are the Lights, Within". But this time it came out in the form of Dargah with some modern digital settings.

Dargah-e-Ayenaah is my attempt to understand the often occurring questions about the self- The philosophical quest, that implores us to ask ourselves who we are? Why we are here? Why somebody is born rich and someone else poor? What is the relation between different living beings? Is there anything in common which connects everybody, regardless of their age, gender, location, race, colour or physical appearences? If that link is the existence of God or the supernatural, super-conscious, an absolute entity which is a general belief system of almost every human being? If so, then what is God? What does God look like? Where does He stays? Where can we find Him? Is He indeed real?

still from Dargaj-e-Ayenaah
Dargah-e-Ayenaah is not rationally proved or an absolute truth. It is my belief that we all have the same spark of that Absolute energy or power which governs the universe. Much like the light of a candle light in comparison to that of a huge 'hawan kund' fire. The fire of both, the candle and 'hawan-kund' have the same ability to give light and heat.

In chapter 10, verse 42 of Bhagavad-Gita, Bhagwan Shree Krishna saying to Arjuna

yad yad vibhutimat sattvam srimad urjitam eva va
tat tad evavagaccha tvam mama tejo-'msa-sambhavam
Which translates into:
Know that all opulent, beautiful and glorious creations
spring from but a spark of My splendor.

In all honesty, I really don't know about the authenticity of these kind of books. Whether they are true or not. But I know one thing, and that is, when you really want to satisfy your thirst, you have to dig, and dig deep on a chosen spot, and indeed you shall find water there. So I choose to believe that if we really want to know God, we have to look within rather than searching him in temples, mosques or dargahs- all of which exist outside the self. Ironically, I havechosen the setting of a Dargah for my installation- in order to convey my belief and idea.

-Kunal Kalra



My Special thanks to Sunil Sir, Faiza Hasan, Ajay Kohli, Joyel Pious for their guidance, love, affection and support for this project.


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