Sarah Cunningham

In this series of mixed media on paper on his own native histories and legacies, Firoz Mahmud draws on the histories of his home in the Bengal region, where many communities and their cultural sites, agriculture, and industries have been transformed by constant colonisations over nearly 2,000 years. Although the rulers of the region legendarily staved off an attack by Alexander the Great in 325 BCE with a cavalcade of elephants, the people and fertile land of the greater Bengal region — spanning present-day Bangladesh and India — have endured continuous waves of military invasion and civil war, including the Islamic conquest led by the Ghurid general Muhammad bin Bakhtiyar Khalji, the Mughal annexation during the reign of Emperor Babur, the defeat of Nawab Siraj-ud-Daulah by the British...