Furnace Fruit

U

Inspired by the collections of the British Library and Leeds Art Gallery, Furnace Fruit is a mixed media exhibition centred around the new two-channel film. It takes as its starting point the story of Punjabi immigrants – including members of the artist’s own family – who found themselves working in British foundries in the 1950s and 1960s.

Panesar was the recipient of the 2024 Collections in Dialogue co-commission from the British Library and Leeds Art Gallery. The resulting exhibition, Furnace Fruit, is based on his research into the Leeds Sculpture Collections at Leeds Art Gallery and the Henry Moore Institute, together with the oral history collections at the British Library and Bradford Industrial Museum.

Following our screening of Furnace Fruit, Karanjit will join us on stage for an in conversation with curator and researcher Rahila Haque, chaired by Leeds Art Gallery curator Clare Nadal, followed by questions from the audience.  

Showing as part of Pavilion Presents.

Doors: 18:00

Start: 18:30

--

Karanjit Panesar (born 1992) is an artist living and working in Leeds. In his practice, oblique explorations of diasporic identity and histories of empire intersect with a structural concern. Often starting from moving image, he constructs stylised and layered installations that contain sculpture and other media. Environments, ideas and objects spill into and out of the space of the screen; artworks are in some way incomplete, asked to be more than one thing at once. Recent solo presentations include: Furnace Fruit, Leeds Art Gallery (2024); Clarence Pier, Aspex Portsmouth (2022); Parts of Wholes, Workplace Foundation, Newcastle (2022); Actor, Container, Two Queens, Leicester (2021); Strange Loop, Turf Projects, Croydon (2019); and THE WAY THINGS ARE, arebyte Gallery, London (2018).

Rahila Haque is a researcher, curator and writer exploring the dialogue between aesthetics and political urgency through feminist epistemologies and anticolonial narratives. She has worked with Somerset House Studios, Camden Art Centre, the Venice Biennale and the Hayward Gallery, and is currently a PhD candidate at the centre for Transnational Art, Identity and Nation (TrAIN) at Chelsea College of Arts, University of the Arts London.

--

Film information

Furnace Fruit, 2024. Two-channel film with surround sound (15 minutes).

Written & directed by: Karanjit Panesar

Performer: Akshay Sharma

Voice Actor: Arjun Singh Panam

Additional Performance: Hardial Singh Panesar

Movement Director: Tora Hed

Original Score: Ashley Keep

Sound Recording Assistant: David Wells

Audio Engineer: Hamish Dixon

Director of Photography (Location): Will Poole

Director of Photography (Foundry): Karanjit Panesar

Editor: Karanjit Panesar

A special thank you to W.B. White Foundry, Brighouse

Installation view of Karanjit Panesar: Furnace Fruit at Leeds Art Gallery, 2024. © Karanjit Panesar. Photo: Rob Battersby