In Search of Baba Singh is the first iteration of an ongoing research project with Aziz Sohail that takes as its jumping off point the arrest record of Baba Singh, a laborer from Punjab, India in California at the turn of the twentieth century. Baba Singh was arrested in 1914 for 'infamous crimes against nature'; a statute that at the time would criminalize a range of sexual behaviors including homosexuality.
Within the exhibition, the viewer encounters a range of works of art as well as archival and textual ephemera that become a means to reveal complex stories of forgotten lives. Through this exhibition, Baba Singh is thus a protagonist whose journey and destiny is unknown and potentially fictional, but through whom various possibilities of writing and recovering a lost queer history can be imagined.
UAG / ROOM Gallery, UC Irvine
February 13, 2019
6.30 - 7 PM: Screening of Rex Vs Singh
7 - 8.00 PM: Lecture performance and conversation with Gazelle Samizay
ONE Archives, USC
909 W Adams Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA
27 February, 2019: 6 - 8 PM
6.30 - 7 PM: Screening of Rex V Singh
7 - 8 PM: Lecture performance and conversation in collaboration with Aziz Sohail