New Delhi, March 1 -- In the third gallery at Ishara Art Foundation in Dubai, you walk into a dimly-lit room with five suspended microphones. Instead of being listening devices, these mics have been transformed into speakers reciting poetry from across time and space-Hum Dekhenge by Faiz Ahmed Faiz, which has become a protest anthem in some Indian universities, a martyr's song in Gondi, and a rendition of text by Nigerian poet-environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa. Titled Listening Air, this artwork by Shilpa Gupta carries forth the artist's preoccupation with the spoken word and ways in which poets and writers transcend boundaries of what can and cannot be spoken.

Listening Air, which was shown at Bikaner House in Delhi recently, speaks ...