Alserkal Arts Foundation
Join us for a talk by visual artists Meher Vahid and Payal Arya as they reflect upon the overlaps and spillages observed within their artistic practice.
Meher Vahid and Payal Arya, visual artists working in Dubai and India, shared a brief intersection by inhabiting the same university in different moments in time. In this session, they explore the overlaps and spillages observed within their artistic practice.
The lens of the landscape becomes a point of departure, while one reflects on the desert as both harsh and generative, the other lingers at the shoreline — tracing the affective and ecological shifts of disappearing land.
Three Pillows I, II & III, a series of 34 images where Meher paints forms of fish flesh, engulfed within the UAE’s desert landscape. The national tree — the Ghaf — is encountered alongside fragments of urban infrastructure, overlaid with a heatwave filter. Fish - a life form that completely dwells in water, observed in the domestic realm as meat for consumption.
In her film मुड पान दी ईच्छा - An Intangible Claim, Payal traverses through her Naani’s (maternal grandmother) memories of being forced to leave her ancestral home at the age of thirteen. The film metaphorically ties together the present-day ecological crisis of Land Reclamation with Naani’s witnessing of the Partition. A land only known through distance is visualised using found footage. The narrative weaves together a deluge of memories and the impending flood, questioning the right to claim and own land.
Time: 4PM - 6PM
Date: Saturday, 21 June 2025
Venue: Common Room, WH51, Alserkal Avenue - Google Pin
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This talk coincides with their exhibition between the desert and the shoreline, on view at Bayt Al Mamzar from 20–22 June.
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Meher Afroz Vahid (b. 1991) is an intermedia artist working between the UAE and India. She holds an MFA from Shiv Nadar University, Delhi (2019), and a BFA from Sir J. J. School of Art, Mumbai (2016). She has been an artist-in-residence at KARA – Kooshk Residency in Tehran (2019) and Sifting Futur in Switzerland (2015). Her debut solo exhibition, Simat Kar Kis Liye Nuqta Nahīn Bantī Zamīn, was held at Threshold Gallery, Delhi in 2019. Her selected group exhibition includes: Bambai Se Aaya Mera Dost (curated by Method), New Delhi, 2025. Lament Traces (curated by Manan Shah) at Apre Art House, Mumbai, 2024. 8x4. Urrea.Zilarra / Gold.Silver (curated by Jasone Miranda-Bilbao), Church of San Martín Obispo, Arrieta, Spain, 2024. Book Show – 1, a travelling exhibition curated by Priyesh Gothwal at Studio Space – Kashmiri Park, Shiv Nadar University, and FICA, Delhi, 2024. Metaphors for Land (curated by Shristi Sainani) at Apre Art House, Mumbai, 2024. Phantom Limb at Raza
Foundation, Delhi, 2019.
Vahid works through lived experience, observing the nascent stages and states of being. Through metaphor, she creates associations: material to membrane, landscape to corporeal identity, and text to event. She speaks of transition through installations that incorporate fluidity, working with time-based photography and painting across layered visuals and texts. In doing so, she documents the ever-present structure of things.
Payal Arya creates site-specific and immersive installations that people inhabit blurring the parameters of the room. She explores the concept of nonlinear time and notions of distance, position, and bodily tolerance, to rethink what it means to have agency. Arya graduated with a BA degree in Psychology and Sociology from Bombay University, 2014, BFA from Rachana Sansad, Bombay, 2013, MFA degree from Shiv Nadar University,
Delhi, 2016. She currently is a Lecturer at Jindal Global University and teaches in the BFA department. Her exhibitions include ‘When No one is Looking’, Kala Ghoda festival, Bombay, 2013, O.P. Jindal Global University, 2025 and her master’s degree show‘ At dusk the sky had turned Violet’, Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, Delhi, 2016. Group shows include ‘Minute per Image’, TIFA, Pune, 2017 collateral to the Pune Biennale, 'Regimes of Truth' at Gati Dance Forum, Delhi, 2018, 'Saavdhaan: The Regimes of Truth' Kalakar Theatre, Delhi, 2018, 'The Future is Here' Bajaj Bhavan, Mumbai, 2019, In search of new names” at Experimenter Viewing room, Kolkata,“Internalising a city” at VHC Gallery, Pune. Group show at Stir Gallery, India Art Fair Parallel event in Delhi in 2023, I, Non I and the Other" alumni show at Shiv Nadar University, "Follow the white rabbit" and "Common Ground" in Pune in 2023. "Measuring life with coffee spoons" at Apre Art House, Group show at Pulp society Delhi in 2024, “Tenderly Kept”, CP Project Space, New York in 2025. She was part of the ‘Amplified Voice’ workshop at Kochi in 2018, an American Arts Incubator program in collaboration with the Kochi Biennale. Artist residency at LAMO (Ladakh Arts and Media Organization) in July, 2018 and 'Shifting Studios', residency at TIFA working studios, Pune, 2019 and artist residency, 'Vacant Zone' in 2021. She was also invited for an intervention as a part of the exhibition at Sara Centre, Karnataka. She was invited to Film Akademie Baden Wurttemberg - Germany where she co - directed, co-produced and did production design for the film 'PIPIO' created a VR experience and an interactive installation. Her film PIPIO was screened at the India Art Fair 2023 and was presented by the Gujral Foundation. Her collaborative photogrammetry film, “Memory is always in the periphery” premiered at New Media Art Space, New York and at Cyber Park, Wrong Biennale in Spain, TRANSBORDA 3 - Portugal and at VAICA 2 a festival for Video Art by Indian Contemporary Artists. She was part of a group exhibition for Iran “Change is resistance”, La Portineria, Florence, Italy. Her film “मुड पान दी ईच्छा An Intangible Claim” was showcased at the 27th Conference of Parties (COP27) in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, and on IkonoTV screening platform and at Divvy Film Festival at Lahore in 2023 and at the School of Visual Arts New York in 2025.
Image courtesy of the artists