Kelvin Dijk
As earth
turns,
process images,
text and thougts
towards graduation
soil
will
be
braided
Can hope persevere amidst what appears to be total destruction?
Together with Phantom Wizard, this work facilitates rehearsals for sustaining inspiration and creation within oppressive times. Through our diasporic reinterpretation of the sacred Hindu scripture describing Shiva’s cosmic dance — a dance in which destruction and creation unfold simultaneously — we trace what it might mean to continue living, imagining, and thriving amidst chaos.
Not as a gesture toward catastrophe as necessary evil, but as an insistence on solidarity through resilience.
As both of our cultural inheritances are shaped not by one singular lineage but by many entangled histories, we also reflect on what it means to carry long-standing Hindu practices as part of a diasporic identity. Through retelling, we reclaim narrative authority and confront the cultural divisions that persist as colonial afterthoughts within Surinamese society.
In doing so, we hope to move closer to breaking the shackles which still cast shadows on our
beloved communities.
And so, making apparent that there is no singular way of being Surinamese.
Kelvin’s practice engages with the (re)production and unraveling of marginalized histories, tracing how these narratives are carried, fractured, and reassembled across time.
Working between the personal and the collective, they approach history as lived and contested. Rooted in questions of cultural inheritance and belonging, the work focuses on the discomfort and complexity these inquiries evoke. Unease is approached not as
something to resolve but as a space for learning.
