End Term Assessment and Self Reflection - Suneptula S Jamir, S173A0039.

Using 2000 to 2500 words, give an evocative description of your favourite painting, photograph, dance-performance or sculpture. Feel free to explore various dimensions of this work - the creative process of the artist behind the work, the spaces of its exhibition, its impact on you, and the work's many afterlives, among other aspects.

The photo that I have chosen is of Kurt Cobain, the lead singer of Nirvana,  performing at the MTV ‘Unplugged in New York’ on 18 November, 1993. It was captured by Frank Micelotta. The Nirvana Unplugged performance is considered one of their finest performance till date. It was also a moment in rock music history where an artist bared his soul  for the audience to see and absorb.

Nirvana is an American Grunge rock band who were at their zenith in the early nineties. Their music is still relevant today especially to the angst-ridden generation that finds their expression in Nirvana’s interpretative lyrics and temperamental music. For that matter, Nirvana’s music will remain relevant for generations to come, because let’s face it, can one name any generation that hasn’t  gone through an existential crisis(?) .

As the term “Unplugged” suggests, the band played songs acoustically unlike their usual arrangement of using the electric guitar. In this particular photo, Kurt is captured while engrossed in singing and playing the guitar during the performance. It seems to be a moment where he is  into performing the song. However, at the same time there is a certain ease in the particular frame. He does not look restrained. He looks calm and settled into this (acoustic) skin of his compared to photos taken during Nirvana’s other performances, where they played their rock songs in its true form .

What I like about this picture is the manner in which Micelotta has captured certain elements  characteristic to this legendary performance by Nirvana. To give context, Kurt had asked for white lilies and black candles for decorating the stage, in a manner  “Exactly. Like a funeral” . The reason he chose lilies could be traced to his liking for said flowers from the family of long,lean petals such as orchids. He called such flowers as “vaginal flowers”. He has time and again featured them  in his art and album covers. He featured them on the artwork for ‘In Utero’ and also used a magnified version of a stamen on the album cover for ‘In Bloom’. Kurt’s visual imagery was highly specific. He was explicit and honest in depicting them.

One can see the white lilies and the black candles obscured in the background with the focus Micelotta chose to take this photo. Kurt is the focus of the picture, yet one cannot ignore the blurry background of the funeral-esque set which in interpretational ways seems to be a hindsight from Kurt’s side of what lied ahead for him. He committed suicide  four months after this performance on 5 April, 1994.

Micellota took a full portrait angle to capture Kurt in the whole frame. In the other photos from the Unplugged performance, most of them have been taken in landscape to encompass the band and the whole set. I like this picture among the others because it gives me a contrary sense of Kurt’s body language during the performance. If one sees the live version, Kurt is jittery and self-doubtful to an extent which can be observed in his comments and asking of feedback from the other band members.

Of course, this side of him was a different experience to watch as he was directly showing the world a stripped version of his tormented genius soul, for what may be the first time ever. Here, Micellota captures Kurt in a self-composed state and that in itself is a feat considering how opposite to it Kurt was throughout the entire show.

As much as I appreciate and empathise with Kurt baring his soul, this photo stood out for me among the others that captured these vulnerabilities of his.  The full frame and focused angle from which the photo has been taken, encapsulates the rare blink-and-you-miss-it kind of moments in the unplugged performances where he is at ease and comfort with himself and his abilities.

The mood in the photograph is further complemented by the lighting in which Micellota has chosen to capture Kurt. The warm, mellow lighting and tone in the picture complements the zen-like moment in which Kurt is seen here. It creates an image of the ‘warmness of the soul’- an intimate and endearing moment one can only have when in touch with what one is doing right at that moment. This picture depicts only a temporary moment at that time of performance and in his life as well.

Kurt in his suicide letter had mentioned that  “I haven't felt the excitement of listening to as well as creating music along with reading and writing for too many years now. I feel guilty beyond words about these things”. He mentioned that being on stage and performing no longer gave him the enthusiasm ,the  kind that Freddie Mercury seemed to revel and enjoy with the audience. Mind you, it’s not a ‘from’ but a ‘with’.

For a true artist to enjoy their art and what they do, they need to be able to honestly enjoy the process and the response with themselves and with the audience too. It is a two way process that makes the performing-watching/listening  aspect of art enjoyable like any other forms of performing arts. The audience would not feel you if you were not putting your soul into the performance.

More often than not,  after listening to certain live performances, we tend to comment that we enjoyed the performance because the artist/performer put their all in it. They seemed to be enjoying what they were doing and that in return made you enjoy watching or listening to them. Nirvana’s unplugged performance falls into this category. You can not help but be drawn into Kurt’s performance. This was not just a show. It was a performance- an unintentionally honest one.

Kurt was a pure soul to admit that he could not fake performance enthusiasm for himself or anyone. In ‘Unplugged in New York’, Kurt was really at his most vulnerable in terms of performance. The environment was a different scenario where he could not hide behind the screams of loud music or even the dismantling of guitars.

The acoustic guitar lended the sincerity to his sensitivity. The 14 set of songs were all songs that the band enjoyed performing to. He was playing what he could feel. He was not faking it. One could see him being ‘in the moment’, a moment that hardly stayed for four more months.

Kurt was a genius, a painful one at that. His sister had said in the documentary “Montage of Heck” that if this was what genius meant, she would rather have none of it. Kurt was a tormented genius soul who would at times be filled with so much to give from his pain and empathy, while at other times be so devoid of himself. It is in this picture that you can see him at one of  his best genuine emotional moments during the performance. For there were also moments where he showed bored apathy reflecting the best of his temperamental, conscious and sensitive personality.

He is one of my favourite musicians. I cannot pin-point what I can exactly relate to: his no nonsense approach, his honesty, his empathy, his pain, his art, his genius, his words, his voice, oh, that pretty little nose of his or that shaggy hair  that he could effortlessly carry off. Kurt Cobain was this pretty, sensitive man with a raspy voice who was a genius of some sorts trapped in a sadly tormented soul. Sigh.

The next visual aspect you see in the picture is his outfit. I would love to raid his vintage-y wardrobe. He had this rad collection of tees and the kind of jackets you find in flea markets. His tees had a life of their own. They spoke his heart out such as with the  “Corporate magazines still suck” tee for the cover shoot with Rolling Stones! . The Flipper record icon that he drew on his shirt right before a photoshoot is also iconic. I can relate to his expression through slogan and art tees at a spiritual level. His clothes were an extension of his personality.

What he wore in  ‘Unplugged in New York’ is so Kurt-nonchalant and effortless.  The fuzzy Grandpa cardigan worn with a collar shirt and another tee underneath paired with Chuck Taylors(the quintessential ‘it’ casual shoes for many or so it seems. I have never  liked them except for when Kurt wore it. Why? Because it’s Kurt!) screams K U R T.

If you look closely, he is wearing a  Frightwig band tee shirt. The Frightwig are an all American feminist punk band. This makes me remember the stances and beliefs Kurt stood for. He had ethics of his own. He detested homophobes, racists and misogynists. He made sure none of their music reflected these three. The tee he is wearing in the picture gives you an inkling about what his choices translated into.

Ironically, Nirvana shirts have become a fashion statement. In a generation where companies manufacture merchandise and clothes affiliated to influential personalities/bands/shows,  people randomly wear such said clothing without even knowing or following the work of the artist/individual. It is such a disgrace to the earlier testament that clothes are an extension of our personality. Yes, I do agree and am aware that this statement is not applicable for those who do not believe in this statement for there are some people who are genuinely least bothered about aesthetics, colors, fit, design, what not. Clothes are only a necessity for them to cover the human nakedness. Nothing more, nothing less. Which in some way does say something about their nonchalant personality.

Also, for those who do not have the means to access the basic minimum clothing, this statement cannot be subjugated to them.  But for those who do have this access and knowledge, the phenomena of exploiting pop culture to establish one’s or another’s identity albeit loosely, without any real interest and specially  against the ideals of that very individual/entity they are commercialising upon, is a rather sad sight and something Kurt himself would frown upon.

Coming to the performance, it was a class apart on its own. It was not perfect but it was raw and honest. It showed a slight glimpse of the transition the band might have taken in their musical journey in the future. It displayed Kurt’s repertoire as a performer. He was an artist, a true artist. If anyone has a doubt about it, the performance in ‘Unplugged in New York’ will speak for itself.

One would think that given the past history between the corporate giants MTV and the anti-establishment Nirvana, it would only be  possible to wish for such a collaboration to take place. Indeed, thanks be to the heavenly mercies that Nirvana followed through with this  unplugged performance on MTV.

As serene as the picture looks, it also has a melancholic twang to it. You cannot help but correlate the contextual instances of the picture to his eventual death. The funeral like set-up, the rare moments when you see him at ease...the ingenuity of the performance itself.

‘Unplugged in New York’ was like a personal farewell that he had organised for himself. It was an adieu, ciao, sayonara, do svidaniya, alvida, a goodbye all rolled in one. It all means the same but there are different ways to put it like Kurt’s ability to create multiple meanings and interpretations out of his work. One will never know if  ‘Unplugged in New York’ was a deliberate foreshadowing of his own nearing death or whether it was his way of saying goodbye or whether it’s a myth of both that gives us the closure to reason the early death of such a beautifully talented soul.

In other words,  this performance is what you make it out to be. Kurt always gave people the freedom for interpretation of his work though he used to say it meant nothing most of the time. I guess he would not mind people like me dissecting and interpreting  his unplugged performance. He would be chuckling up there instead and giving that creepy, cynical smile like the one he gave during the performance just because his manager had asked him to smile more. Ha ha Kurt.

For me, this photograph encapsulates the lines from one of the songs performed that evening  :

What else could I be, all apologies.

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Self Reflective Essay.

When this semester began, I wanted to take a course that would revive the creative side in me which had been dormant for a long time. I remember seeing the course outline of the ‘Ways of Reading’ course and thinking to myself that I would really like to learn how to look at and understand text differently than the way I used to. The reading materials also intrigued me especially the poetry section since it had been some time after my second year of Bachelors that I have had the chance to read and study poetry as part of the syllabus. I missed reading and trying to understand poetry.

This opportunity came in many folds when I read the poetry of my fellow mates on the class blog. I could respond to some of the poems through my imagination and some through personal experience, as suggested by Stephen Dobyns. Reading through his text made me conscious of the way I wrote my poetry. I tried using metaphors in my poem “The Room” to convey the state of my mind through the state of the door in my room. I also tried to use line breaks and spacing in this specific poem to create a sense of understanding in the reader. I enjoyed writing this particular poem.

Another experience I will remember is the picture of a smiling Sudha Bharadwaj standing next to a police gypsy. We were asked to write what came to our mind seeing this picture. I had no idea who she was before that day. My context for interpreting this picture came from a different angle. All I had for cues were her body language and her facial expression to understand who she is. I remember Sir asking us to specify each details that intrigued us.

This day on which the picture was shown in class will  remain dear to me because the last picture I took with my phone was that  of Bhardwaj’s picture projected on the white board. Well, my phone met its untimely death on that rainy August  evening. Bittersweet indeed. Also, this experience with analysing the photo in class helped me for the recent assessment while framing the write-up on my favorite photo.

It was while doing these assessments that I realised I wasn’t cribbing about working on it unlike for others and the best part of it all is that I genuinely enjoyed doing the creative writing assessments. For someone who felt  trapped by the overly theoretical nature of my course (Development Studies), taking this course was a ray of sunshine in my academic schedule.

I let myself go hands-free with my thoughts whenever it comes to writing the assessments for this course. It has been a liberating experience for me.

I have seen myself articulate and dissect my thoughts more consciously than I used to do. Previously, all I would do while reading poetry was to try and understand the underlying meaning through the words itself. Now, I try to understand the finer nuances that the 6 S’s can bring to a poem. This was all the more fun to read and understand through the poems on the class blog and the class discussions.

If there is one course in Ambedkar University that has made me learn and be genuinely happy while doing it, this course is it for me.