In 2023, when Akanksha Patil arrived in Shivangaon village in Maharashtra’s Nashik district, she encountered stories shaped by loss and displacement. An artist whose current practice explores saudade—a deep longing for a home that may no longer exist—she had initially come to the village for landscape studies, till 2021. Over time, however, she chose to stay on, expanding her inquiry to examine the migration through the lives of Shivangaon’s residents, who were impacted by the expansion of Nagpur airport.
Patil’s ongoing exhibition at Delhi’s Gallery Art Positive, ‘Narratives in Transit’, curated by Georgina Maddox, engages with themes of migration and erasure. It sheds light on the tensions between rural life and urban expansion, while foregrounding the lived realities of forced displacement.
It was in 2023, following her master’s studies, that she began formally documenting the stories of the community. “I spent eight years visiting Shivangaon as a sanctuary for my studies. Initially, I focused on my own sense of saudade. However, when the village began to be demolished for airport expansion, my motive changed. I became a vessel for the community’s voice. I spent two and a half years documenting the physical shift from a living village to a demolition site,” she says.
The exhibition is the result of a multi-year process rooted in field research, documentation, and material exploration. Her works captures the fading mohalla culture and disappearance of livelihoods in the village. “It is the evolution of a practice that began with an exploration of my own roots and longings, eventually expanding to witness and document the universal experience of displacement,” Patil explains.
The foundation of the works in this exhibition was built over two years of closely observing Shivangaon’s changing landscape. Through video and photography, she documented the village’s gradual disappearance. “I began to see patterns of loss that connect individual stories to a broader narrative of migration,” she notes. During this time, she met several residents whose experiences left a lasting impression—among them, Patil recalls a woman cooking amidst the chaos of packing up her life, distressed about arranging rent and worried about her child missing school because of the move.
In her practice, Patil uses cardboard as a primary medium—a material closely associated with movement, packaging, and storage, symbolising both migration and the fragile idea of home. Its malleability, low cost, and ease of reuse allow her to work sustainably, adding an eco-conscious dimension to her work. The acts of repurposing and recycling, combined with creative approaches to environmental challenges, remain central to her process and sense of hope.
Working on this project has also reshaped her understanding of “development”. What once appeared as a series of physical or economic milestones now reveals itself as a far more complex human process. “For the people living on that land, it means the literal disappearance of their history,” she reflects. “When I saw the walls of Shivangaon being torn down, I realised that ‘progress’ often comes at the cost of someone else’s sanctuary.”
At its core, Patil’s socially engaged practice seeks to create a living archive. By documenting the journey of Shivangaon and its people, she ensures that their stories of displacement “do not vanish beneath the literal concrete of progress”.
On view at Gallery Art Positive, Old MB Road, Lado Sarai, until April 27, from 11 am to 7 pm