A Lost Future: Shezad Dawood

“A Lost Future: Shezad Dawood” is the first of a three-part exhibition that challenges existing histories and speculative futures across cultures and in Bengal—a culturally rich region divided between present-day India and Bangladesh. The exhibitions explore themes of virtuality, modernity, and world-making in ways that are universal as well as interconnected and specific to this region.

This exhibition features an interactive virtual reality experience of the Indian hill station Kalimpong, linking a haunting nostalgic portal to a future alternative reality. Expanding on some of the sites and stories in Dawood’s paintings and sculptures on view, the virtual reality work allows visitors to travel from the mythic Himalayan Hotel into the mountains, an adjacent monastery, and beyond.