The past cannot be undone, the future cannot be assured. Caught between them, the present is precarious, exposed to the chaotic interplay of a universe in cyclical flux.

One recent theory of consciousness proposes that the phenomenon, so elusive, so subjective, arises from predictive processing – that, through the accident of its design, it divines order. Mani Kambo’s resonant first solo exhibition is attuned to the cusp between what has been and what is to be. Drawing upon the inherent potency of archetypal images, it creates a sort of sacred space in which the hush of contemplation can bind the two together; as a wish, as a spell, as a prayer.  

At the Baltic in Gateshead, there’s intention and attention in the artist’s every detail. For example, Kambo carefully selected both the font used on the gallery exterior and the brown clay hue of its inner walls. In more ways than one, it repays a closer look. Beside the larger pieces, smaller rocks, laser etched to give up the secret of their interiors, mark out the territory, like pebble constellations in an astrological map set in scattered stone. In keeping with this esoteric cosmology, the exhibition’s title, Ax-is Mun-di, refers to a line, once believed to run through the Earth’s centre, connecting both the heavens above and the underworld below; the pivot around which the universe itself was said to revolve. It’s a geocentric myth which shapes both the manner in which Kambo has made use of the gallery space, its pieces distributed like planets circling its focal point, and, to some extent, the form of the works themselves.  

A free-standing rope, for instance, anchored by a stone inked with an eye in a pyramid (the mark of the Illuminati) brings to mind not only the Indian rope trick, in which the magician’s assistant would be seen to ascend and disappear, but consciousness itself, and its Tardis-like property of containing within the span of a single skull the vastness of opposites across the breadth of infinity; above and below, Heaven and Hell. The wall facing it, on which is mounted a display of sacred knots, acts as a reminder of the way that rope itself binds time – a mnemonic of the hours devoted by its maker to bringing it into existence.  

It’s the centre, ultimately, which holds things together. Marked out as a circle by banners themselves emblazoned with the bold symbolism Kambo has channeled from her own Sikh heritage, vividly rendered in monochrome accentuated by yellow, it has the quality of both focusing and radiating the exhibition’s potential energy. Suspended at its heart is a pendulum, capable either of keeping time or being used for divination. Like the sun, at once both astronomical and astrological, the open circle fuses the helices of science with the archetypes of the collective unconsciousness, giving rise to a form of illumination that privileges neither form nor knowledge.

Wordless, it can nonetheless be read, like the Tarot cards a second wall suggests in the forms of a shelf of dark rectangles, each etched with a darker symbol, potent with portent. They, too, have counterparts in the larger forms of occult heraldry on the wall adjacent, Manichean in their black-and-white duality, fearful in their slight asymmetry. This repetition of theme and content amplifies Kambo’s effect, so that, cumulatively, the subtle insinuations of each ripple of symbolic meaning produce a wave of deeper magnitude, felt as much as seen.

Eye-opening and spellbinding, Ax-is Mun-di is an auspicious augury for Kambo’s developing vision. 

By Desmond Bullen, Chief Arts Correspondent

Main image: Mani Kambo Ax·is Mun·di, 2024, installation view. Photo: John Mckenzie © 2024 Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art

 

Mani Kambo, Ax-is Mun-di, is at Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art until June 1,2025. For more information, click here.