Borrowed Light

Borrowed Light, Installation view PalaisPopulaire by Deutsche Bank, Berlin 2024 Photo Mathias Schormann

From the early history of astro-photography to the discovery of light bending around strong gravitational forces to create extraordinary lensing effects, the observation of light is at the heart of astronomy. Much of Devasher’s work looks at the history of observation and the methods and materials that have been employed in the field, both in the past and today.

In particular she has been looking at the work of historian of science Omar W. Nasim whose book ‘Observing by Hand – Sketching the Nebulae in the Nineteenth Century’ delves specifically into the relationship between the observer, the object and the instrument used to record, which in this case was the hand.

“Observation is not about looking harder or more transparently. Neither is it only a matter of looking with the eyes alone. It also a matter of recording, ordering, processing, and preparing. Certain practices of recording – namely sketching by hand – helped observers see more and differently.”

In the summer of 2017, Devasher spent 26 days on board the High Trust, an oil tanker, as part of an artist’s residency program called the ‘Owners Cabin’. May and June are Milky Way season in the Southern Hemisphere. Devasher’s voyage on the Pacific Ocean during this time meant that every night the Milky Way arched overhead. Added to this was the fact that as per international shipping rules, the use of deck lighting at night was carefully controlled to prevent it from negatively impacting night vision, to maintain an effective lookout. The result was stunning dark skies with almost no light pollution. Every night Devasher documented the night sky blazing with stars that those of us in cities no longer see.

Borrowed Light asks us to think about the ways in which astronomers use the objects we can see to understand the ones we cannot, such a dark energy and dark matter. For Devasher, this set of three hybrid print drawings are a way to look deeper and allow new vocabularies of mark making and possibly meaning to emerge. Marked with signs and unclear coordinates, these are alternative maps of the light of the skies and stars as she saw them.