Birender Yadav

Caste Brick, 2024

Caste Brick is a terracotta cube installation that speaks to the enduring legacy of brick-making in the subcontinent. Harking back to archeological findings of the Indus Valley civilization, the tradition of brickmaking is an indigenous knowledge system that has been passed on and solidified into mass production. In spending time with the workers in the brickmaking industry in Mirzapur, Eastern Uttar Pradesh, the artist comes across a complex socio-economic system where marginalized groups of landless bonded laborers from different religious and ethnic backgrounds specialize in different tasks of production, often in precarious and lethal conditions. An uneasy camaraderie develops over time between these communities to protect themselves from the exploitations of the brick kiln owners, while young people fall in love and marry across castes. In Yadav’s words, this is ‘a microcosm of our society divided by caste and religion but in unity for work comes alive around brick kilns.’ Attempting to monumentalize this vernacular aesthetic while bringing back to mind the ‘sweat of labor’, Cast Brick is a grid-like installation of large-size terracotta cubes molded from laborers’ clothes using plaster of Paris, where the twist and fold of fabric are imprinted and fired into the terracotta surface like the human skin.  The installation seeks to confront the socio-economic and environmental impact of brick-making, forging connections between the materials and their history, while underscoring the cross-border ties between India and Pakistan. LB03 is Yadav’s first project in Pakistan.

Birender Kumar Yadav (b.1992) is a multidisciplinary artist born in Ballia, Uttar Pradesh, and migrated to Jharkhand, and now lives in New Delhi, India. His works are grounded in the experiences of exploitation and oppression of the laboring castes and class around him. Yadav’s work has been shown internationally in exhibitions such as the Berlin Biennale, Indian Ceramics Triennale, and more.