An artist who died and was revived is to reveal snapshots of life beyond death in breath-taking digital images.

Royal Shakespeare Company actor and artist Shiv Grewal experienced ‘total recall’ of what happened when his heart stopped and in the month-long coma that followed.

Asian Image:

Finally home May 2013

Asian Image:

Old friends, actors Sartaj Garewal and Nitin Ganatra supporting Shiv's new artistic career at Ganapati Restaurant Peckham Rye, with wife Alison Chadwick (photo by Tony Brown 2015)

Reboot at The Sanctum Hotel, London, (August 15 – September 24) is the latest exhibition from Indian-born London-based artist Shiv Grewal, whose life was smashed to pieces when his near-death experience of a cardiac arrest left him in a month-long coma five years ago. 

A professional actor, and artist trained in architecture and design, Shiv was revived after six to eight minutes in a rare and extraordinary recovery. 

Despite the luck of the ambulance being so near, it took a number of attempts to restart his heart. He suffered brain hypoxia as a result and now battles with epilepsy.

Reboot is a rare insight into the oldest and most profound question of all; what happens when we die …?  

Asian Image:

Rehab class at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance,Shiv Grewal with neurophysio Gemma Cook (Photo by Roswitha Chesher 2015)Asian Image:

Asian Image:

EMERGE AGENCY,part of REBOOT exhibition at Sanctum Hotel Soho which opens 15 August

Shiv said: “Reboot seeks to move on from my recovery, which of course is ongoing. Move on to a new vantage point where after five years, I can correlate a new set of (always shifting) circumstances, which might allow me to move forward… I am pushing for a new connection with a new world.

 “The artworks engage in the familiar tropes that have obsessed me my whole life, used both as a metaphor and as a map of rediscovery. Tropes of science fiction float and fuse with personal memories and digital futuristic landscapes, recognisable and unfamiliar patterns of architecture, mechanics and biology. 

"The artworks are a portal into another world and ask the viewer to look further.”

Inspired by his deep interest in highly eclectic subjects, ranging from science fiction dystopias to quantum theory and shamanic experiments, 

Exhibition Details:
REBOOT AT SANCTUM HOTEL, SOHO, LONDON
15 AUGUST – 24 SEPTEMBER 2018