2010
2022
Indira Gandhi International Airport 2022
Social Anxiety: Movement, Proximity, and the Post-
This video artwork forms part of an ongoing research-
During the lockdown period, public movement was heavily regulated and, in many cases, reduced to minimal functional activity. The body became a site of both biological risk and social suspicion. Ordinary gestures—passing someone in the street, standing in a queue, sharing space in transport systems—were reframed through the lens of contagion. This video research investigates the lingering psychological and behavioural traces of that moment. Even after restrictions were lifted, subtle patterns of hesitation, avoidance, and recalibration remained visible in the choreography of everyday movement.
The work therefore examines social anxiety not as an individual pathology but as a collective behavioural condition produced by an extraordinary political and medical event. The camera records individuals navigating newly reopened public environments: streets, transit spaces, entrances, and shared urban areas. These spaces operate as sites where the social contract is renegotiated in real time. Viewers observe bodies adjusting distances, redirecting pathways, and negotiating invisible boundaries that had previously been codified through public health messaging.
From a methodological perspective, the project adopts strategies drawn from documentary video art, ethnographic observation, and spatial analysis. The footage is not staged. Instead, it captures unscripted behavioural patterns that emerge when individuals encounter others within shared environments. The resulting imagery resembles a form of urban choreography in which hesitation, deviation, and reorientation become the dominant gestures. Movement itself becomes the subject of the artwork.
The piece also engages with a longer tradition in contemporary art that investigates the politics of the body in public space. Artists and theorists have long examined how architecture, surveillance, and social norms shape behaviour. The pandemic introduced an additional layer: biological governance. Concepts such as social distancing, quarantine, and risk management transformed the meaning of proximity. This work situates itself within that context, exploring how these temporary regulatory measures may leave lasting imprints on collective behaviour.
In visual terms, the video foregrounds rhythm and repetition. People emerge from buildings, cross paths, hesitate, or redirect their movement. These small gestures accumulate into a wider portrait of a society transitioning from restriction toward tentative reconnection. The work does not attempt to judge or resolve these behaviours. Instead, it functions as a visual archive of a transitional moment in social history.
Ultimately, the artwork asks a broader question: what happens to social confidence after a prolonged period of isolation and fear? The footage suggests that the return to public life is neither immediate nor seamless. The social body must relearn its movements. Personal space, once an informal cultural norm, becomes temporarily exaggerated and consciously negotiated. What was once unconscious social choreography becomes visible.
As a research-