Our present isn’t as depicted in sci-fi movies back in the ‘80s or ‘90s. Yes, we have crossed over to the new millennium but cars are still driven on roads and no cybernetic organisms seen to be walking around, uttering, “Hasta la vista, baby!”

Perhaps it wouldn’t have made it to the box office to project an almost-ordinary future. Or was Hollywood (and the rest of us) mistaken as to where science and technology would change our lives?

Did we foresee corridor talks to take place in chat rooms instead, today? Or that we no longer yell for our children to come down for dinners – we call on their mobile phones instead? And that our postmen to carry special occasions snail mails now – invitations, greeting cards – but even those we begin to receive virtually.

The world we live in today is a hurried one. We talk, walk, and eat, faster – as if we’re afraid time would leave us behind. Our relation with others is mostly through one gadget or another. Life is fast-paced and to some extent, more purposeful. We demand ourselves to be accomplished individuals and are for the most part, impatient to arrive. We become fixated on the ending – result, result, result; the how is secondary and mistakes are time wasters.

Since when is life meant to be so precise? If it doesn’t end with a stunning success, is it any less extraordinary? Even if we fail to learn from it, wouldn’t it be a lesson for everyone else?

La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona is perhaps the most exceptional work by Antoni Gaudi. He dedicated 40 years of his life to the basilica and died in 1926 not having seen it completed. Today, 85 years on, it draws millions of visitors each year, despite being a work-in-progress. A masterpiece may be unfinished but it is still nothing less. Scheduled for completion 20 years to come, the sketches, notes and models left behind by the architect are guiding the work through.

In this lifetime, a Brit, one Dave Hawkin, goes into the woods in search for oil beetle as a hobby. When asked why the peculiarity of the hobby and choice of insect, he replies, “Why do things have to have a point? Looking for stuff is nice – within that you find a purpose.”1

It is not to say that destinations don’t matter; if such were true, Alice would still be lost in her Wonderland. Just that for as long as we store the picture of ideal in our minds, and continue to sketch and pave our ways as we move along, life would be more meaningful - enjoyable even. And perhaps, even if for nothing else, mistakes would make amusing anecdotes to tell our grandchildren. Ones we are to open with, “Back when I was young and foolish…”

Processing Form is a credit to the contributions of Gaudi to the world of architecture; to Hawkin’s oil beetles, whatever the purpose may be; to Anissa Abd Aziz, Ahmad Zuraimi Abd Rahim, and Shahrul Hisham, and their bravery to share what others keep tightly hidden; and to all of us – as artists who paint our dreams and sculpt our future – may we never lose our gumption for life. This time we credit the process: the art in the making of art.

Galeri Chandan is first and foremost, a business entity. And to hold an intellectual exhibition such as this is a showcase of our passion for arts. May this be one of the many avenues that would create greater appreciation for visual arts in this country, and may our lives be richer because of it.

GALERI CHANDAN