"Nothing can ever happen twice. In consequence, the sorry fact is that we arrive here improvised and leave without the chance to rehearse."
— Wisława Szymborska
Nothing Twice brings together nine young contemporary women artists exploring the unrehearsed nature of everyday existence. Borrowing from Nobel laureate Szymborska's poem 'Nothing Twice', the exhibition examines how artists create spaces of discreet testimony through small gestures and overlooked details. It is from this poignant acknowledgement of life’s unrepeatable texture that the exhibition unfolds, bringing together these works that locate the profound within the ephemeral, and the monumental within the minutiae of quotidian life.
A carefully created form holds memory and loss. A captured moment freezes time while acknowledging its passage. A stitched line becomes a meditation on endurance. A brushstroke registers both presence and absence. Through their hands and lenses, the mundane reveals itself as a space where grief, resilience, and care gently intertwine. Through their choice of subject matter and materials, these artists suggest that the minor and the profound are inseparable. They understand that life's most significant moments often occur in private, intimate spaces outside of the observed—in kitchens, bedrooms, or in an overlooked corner of the dwelling space. Their work dignifies these unheeded territories, transforming inherited rhythms of feminine labour into languages of attention, fortitude, defiance, and rebellion.
By choosing media that embody impermanence—fabric that frays, clay that cracks, paint that fades, images that capture the ephemeral—these artists align their practice with Szymborska's insight about this unrepeatable existence. Their small gestures accumulate into statements about survival, tenderness, and the vital qualities of intimate spaces.
By attending closely to detail, repetition, and materiality, the artists transform the mundane into expressions of attention, tenderness, and survival.
Ushmita Sahu
