‘Opaque Waters & Brutal Suns (Hydrogenesis)’ is a story of many stories. Of beginnings that are endings, and endings that are beginnings. This work engages with the confluence of migration, violent histories, and liquid extractions and flows. Indexing field research from along the Suriname River and the Awadh Plains, the work oscillates between the past and present of these two places. This project takes us to the ports & and paths of this once-historic migratory route to confront how colonial inheritances continue to shape us. Ruminating on water bodies, contested histories, and unruly ‘development’, this project examines how paradigms of colonial violence reemerge in new forms within Faizabad and Paramaribo. Opaque Waters & Brutal Suns maps a constellation of transcontinental histories across three centuries by returning to sites that entangle these two places and their histories.
