Private Thoughts Public Moments

Curated by artist/curator Sutapa Biswas, Private Thoughts Public Moments, 2001-2002 was curated by Sutapa Biswas at the invitation of Dr. Judith Mastai, Head of Public Programmes and Curator at the Art of Ontario, Canada to develop a project / exhibition over the duration of a formal residency as 'Artist / Curator' at the AGO as part of their curatorial and educational programme. Biswas elected to collaborate with the AGO in curating the first site-specific exhibition in the history of the museum, within the Historical Galleries of the AGO. The title of this exhibition was coined by Biswas at a formal meeting with the then AGO's Director, its curatorial staff, and Judith Mastai during Biswas recalls, "...having had 'private thoughts' in the context of the meeting, at what was in effect 'a public moment'." For Biswas the exhibition title encapsulated not only that particular moment, but for Biswas underlined her felt experience of walking through many of the historic museum collections in different parts of the 'global north' (occident).

Process: Following an open call to all artists living and working in the Toronto locale from which a long list was drawn, Biswas and Mastai conducted in-person artist studio visits after; a short-list was drawn and a final selection of artists made by Biswas and Mastai. For Biswas and Mastai, the strongest submissions met by the open call brief, came from a group of younger generation of women artists of South Asian heritage based in the Toronto region - Neena Arora, Asma Arshad Mahmood, Rachel Kalpana James and Meera Sethi. After in-person meetings with these artists held at the AGO - and in particular in the historical collections galleries - Biswas returned to the UK, continuing to mentor these four artists for a several months throughout the development of their ideas for site-specific works for exhibition at the AGO, supported by Judith Mastai, the AGO teams and the Toronto-based arts organisation SAVAC.

Private Thoughts / Public Moments presented a ground-breaking moment wherein the AGO was brought to consider more directly, its own history in the context of the wider colonial history of Canada as a nation state, alongside the complex history of diasporic communities now settled in Canada.

[Please note images of the site-specific will be uploaded to this site in due course. A recording of the public lecture hosted by the AGO on 14 September 2000 is held in the personal archives of Sutapa Biswas. For further information please enquire with DACS re the Art30Recollect Award to Biswas.]