A Unique Coming Together In Majuli

Assembly of Desire is a multidisciplinary symposium and festival initiated by desire machine collective extending the project Periferry. The proposed programme took place during 12th to 15th January this year.

- Meenakshi Thirukode

The long journey to Majuli island in Assam is just one physical manifestation of what has been a long friendship with Desire Machine Collective and the two persons behind it—Mriganka and Sonal. While we have never had an actual opportunity to be together (and I never imagined it would be with so many others who have built different intensities of an intimate friendship with these two), there have been numerous conversations around some of the ideas and provocations and processes the assembly sought to ignite and re-fuel, over the course of time. This form of a relationship with fellow artists and cultural producers is not new to me. It’s the only kind I have known. It’s the only space from which the work that I do has emerged—at times smooth, at times difficult, at times successful and many a times a failure but the friendships always grow. And perhaps that’s where I would like to start. How do we think through friendships as a foundation? Or is foundation too strong and too solid—do we need something more pliable, constantly being shaped and re-shaped?

Friendships as a Way of Resistance