Thukral & Tagra are working on new forms of public engagement and trying to broaden the scope of what art can do, as well as emphasising through their archives and publications what practice can do in a virtual context. Over the last 20 years they have offered socio-political commentary implicit in their aesthetics. More recently, they have sought to define practice as pedagogy through the collaborative Pollinator.io, an interdisciplinary lab developing an inclusive learning ecosystem to enable knowledge sharing through cross-pollination. T&T's repertoire of both subversive and playful games, as well as a vehicle for art pedagogy and social awareness, helped to broaden the scope of art practice and deepen its engagement with the contemporary outside the white cube.

Through the work of the artists, one can witness the convergence of four parts of their practice: a) a long-standing interest in the socio-economics of society; b) a growing interest in research and in creating a lexicon for existing systems; and, c) a desire to grasp the urgency of using games or the metaphorical vocabulary of games as a pedagogical tool, d) public engagement through an empathetic approach, applying artistic agency to question the status quo and at the same time offer hope.

All photographs: Courtesy of the artist

THUKRAL & TAGRA
INDIA

Bread, Circuses and Me, 2022. Installation, variable dimensions.

'Panem et circuses', in addition to providing free wheat to the citizens of Rome