Two Koli artists are recording shifts in their identity via pop-up museums

The Tandels' first pop-up was held last month near their own koliwada. It dealt with the work of the late Dattatray Mahadeo Koli (1931-2004)

Parag Tandel’s parents used to tell him a story that all parents in Thane’s Chendani-Koliwada told their children: If he ventured to catch fish in the creek abutting the village, he would most certainly be attacked by the monster maankaape, or “neck cutter”, that lurked on its banks. This piece of fiction, invented to save little ones from falling into the water, rarely stopped young Parag from fishing in that water body nor in the multiple lakes and fish farms nearby. Had he not found his calling in contemporary art, he would have liked to have sold dried fish for