Amit Kalra is an artist working in video and sculpture. His practice engages performative systems and institutional grammars, examining how symbolic structures operate across opacity and aesthetic legibility. Using slowed movement, found footage, and reduced sound registers, his video works explore the mechanics of persuasion and control. Sculptural works extend these concerns through industrial remnants and ritual materials, often attending to moments structured to pass unnoticed. Kalra holds a graduate degree from the Royal College of Art and teaches in the MFA Communications Design program at Pratt Institute. He has exhibited internationally, held residencies at Vermont Studio Center and Pratt, and has been featured on NTS Radio.
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Highly Effective People, 2023, single-channel video, sound; 1 hour and 58 minutes.
Highly Effective People is a two-channel video work pairing conservative political commentator Glenn Beck with self-help author Stephen Covey. In one frame, Beck delivers a televised eulogy, recounting Covey’s repeated praise for his role in “making the country better.” Adjacent to this, Covey appears before a paying audience, outlining his strategy for influence as personal salvation. The juxtaposition flattens tribute into sales pitch, collapsing eulogy, branding, and national aspiration into a continuous performance of belief.