Impossible Conversations

Impossible Conversations is an exhibition and film installation by artists and filmmakers, Pratāp Rughani and David Chung. The film centers a seemingly impossible dialogue between Arno Michaelis, a former Neo-Nazi gang founder and Pardeep Kaleka, son of the Sikh Temple President, Satwant Singh Kaleka, one of seven people killed in the shooting attack at the Oak Creek Sikh Temple (Gurudwara) by a white supremacist in 2012. 

The film installation explores what happens when – for over a decade – Pardeep and Arno committed to a path of restorative communication — to listen deeply and connect with what motivates each other in the genesis and aftermath of atrocity.

How does healing begin? From the toxic polarization, division and extreme racist violence that resulted in one of the worst mass shootings at a religious site in American history, Pardeep insists that complete healing must eventually be a collective process for all, to liberate both sides.

At Stamps Gallery, Impossible Conversations will be accompanied by a dialogue and research room as well as photomurals that expand on the themes of restorative justice, gun violence, and how to sustain difficult dialogues to combat extremism and toxic polarization. 

Exhibition curated by Srimoyee Mitra. Impossible Conversations has been supported in part by the Arts Research: Incubation & Acceleration (ARIA) program of The University of Michigan Office of the Vice President Research and the Arts Initiative, Institute of Firearm Prevention Pilot Grant, the Stamps School of Art and Design, and the University of the Arts London. 

Exhibition Programs

An Opening Screening, Talkback, and Reception will take place on Friday, January 17, 2025 from 5:30 – 8 pm, and a Symposium will take place on Saturday, January 18, 2025 from 11 am — 5 pm.

About the Artists

Pratāp Rughani is a writer and non-fiction filmmaker. His work develops documentary practice to enable people of radically different perspectives come into relation, sometimes in the aftermath of violence and atrocity for example in South Africa, Aboriginal Australia, Europe, Rwanda and the USA. Configuring a pro-filmic space to enable shared ​“witnessing” and the path towards restorative justice is a driving force in ​“Impossible Conversations” evolving through his practice in over thirty documentary films and exhibitions for BBC TV, Channel 4, Modern Art Oxford, galleries and activist groups. The ethics of giving sustained attention to the experiences of marginalized, excluded or sometimes reviled ​“others” and bringing them in relationship to the broader culture is central to his research into ethics of storytelling and the development of ​“Restorative Narrative.”

Rughani writes widely on the ethics of creative practice, serves on several editorial Boards, has won awards for film, teaching, and research, and is Professor of Documentary Practices at the University of the Arts, London.

David Chung is an acclaimed visual artist and filmmaker. His work focuses on how identities are shaped in immigrant communities and the challenges of refugees as they integrate into new homelands.

Chung has exhibited his drawings, prints, and video installations at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Asia Society, the Walker Arts Center, the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Gwangju Biennale, the Smithsonian Institution, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art. Chung has received a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship and the National Board Film Board of Canada’s Award for Best Documentary Film. He was the 2013 Kim Koo Visiting Professor at Harvard University. 

Chung is a professor and the director of the MFA Graduate Program at the University of Michigan Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design.