An Indian-born artist will spend 40 days and 40 nights in isolation as a 'Hermit' in a museum tower, having access only to an internet blog to interact with public details of few rarest of rare artifacts.
Kolkata-born Ansuman Biswas, 43 will assume the role of 'Manchester Hermit' from June 27 to August 5 at the Manchester Museum's Gothic tower. Biswas is presently based in London. The museum at the University of Manchester holds a collection of over four million specimens and objects. Like many museums, only a small proportion of the collection is on public display.
Biswas will ask the public to reassess the value of the museum's hidden collections, casting light on a different object from the stores for each day of his residency. Working closely with the museum's curators, Biswas will select 40 objects from the museum's vast collection, focusing on the hidden gems.
Through his blog, he will engage members of the public in debate about why museums collect and preserve objects, whilst allowing species and cultures to become forgotten and extinct.
He will also question the relationship of human beings to the natural world, hinting at the inevitable extinction n of the human race itself. Some of these objects will be highly valued in terms of their academic and scientific importance, rarity or aesthetic beauty, whilst others will be forgotten objects that have been overlooked and underused by the museum.
Biswas has a wide-ranging international practice encompassing music, film, live art, installation, writing and theatre. Over the last few years his work has included
directing Shakespeare in America, translating Rabindranath Tagore's poetry from the Bengali, spending two days blindfolded in an unknown place and being sealed in a box for 10 days with no food or light.
