Hit Man Gurung and Sheelasha Rajbhandari create works drawn from an extensive research-based practice that examines the plurality of narrative. They are also members of ArTree Nepal, founded in 2013, a collective that draws upon the country’s diverse Indigenous ontologies. Drawing on ritual, myth, oral traditions, and how such practices sit, at times uncomfortably, aside historical recountings, Gurung and Rajbhandari manage a dynamic synthesis that suggests cohesion more than enmity. Their recent works examine the geopolitical situation of Nepal, its historical importance as a trans-Himalayan trade route, and the demands on its labour market and natural resources impacted by the ever-increasing influence of neighbouring India and China. One of the enduring legends of Nepali history is that of the gurkhas, fierce mercenary soldiers who have been feared in myriad battles over centuries. That today a disproportionate number of Nepali soldiers have been recruited by Russia to fight its war in Ukraine is but a continuation of this story. It reflects a larger phenomenon of Nepali migrant labour—most prominently to Malaysia and the Gulf States—the product of both economic instability and its resulting social fragmentation. In Gurung and Rajbhandari’s newly commissioned work A Map of Faded Dreams (2024–25), from Malayan batik textiles a Gurkha soldier sends home as offerings to a migrant labourer in the Qatari desert dreaming of Himalayan kaphal (bayberries), the spectral effects of the colonial uprooting of Indigenous peoples in the last century and the contemporary realities of labour exploitation are merged with a deeply personal reflection on family narratives, the resonance of both macro- and micro-historical conditions resounding into Nepal’s present.

Commissioned by Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW), co-produced by Hit Man Gurung and Sheelasha Rajbhandari and HKW, 2024–25

Works in the exhibition: A Map of Faded Dreams (2024–25), cyanotype prints on archival paper, screen prints on cotton, video, audio, wallpaper, batiks, dimensions variable. Courtesy of Hit Man Gurung’s family photo archive, Mekh Limbu’s family photo archive, Subas Tamang, Anju Nagarkoti