Neeta Madahar
Born 1966, London, lives and works in London, England
Sustenance 114, 2003, Iris print on Somerset Velvet paper, 5/15, 35” x 47”, DeCordova Museum Collection, Museum Purchase 2004.122
Neeta Madahar is interested in examining the complexities of human domesticity through the behavior of birds. In her Sustenance series, Madahar created documentary images of birds feeding on the balcony of her apartment in suburban Boston. Captured by the artist’s voyeuristic lens at a bird feeder as they gather and eat, these birds become metaphors for human behavior. They are “so similar to us in the way they feed and socialize, in their patterns of behavior,” explains the artist, “that they became perfect symbols…as a natural extension of ourselves.” These living creatures are on display like artifacts in a diorama frozen in time and space for human interpretation.
Madahar’s bright flash gives these images a staged, hyper-real appearance, accentuating the landscape as constructed and built by humans in an effort to commune with nature. As such, the pictures emphasize our interdependent system; we lure these birds with food to see them near our homes while the animals come to expect these plastic feeders. Because the series takes place over the course of a year and through the seasons, we witness the bare winter months when the animals’ survival depends on these artificial sources of food and this strange symbiotic relationship becomes most evident.
