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Charmi Gada Shah and Sujith SN at Vadehra Art Gallery

August 28, 2013•Art, Photography

Ipshita Sen of Saffronart shares a note on the current exhibitions at Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi

New York: After a long hot summer, Vadehra Art gallery in New Delhi, welcomed the new art season with cutting edge solo exhibitions by artists Charmi Gada Shah & Sujith SN. The exhibitions are presented as part of the Foundation for Indian Contemporary Art’s (FICA) Emerging Artist Award 2011, shared by the two artists.

Charmi Gada Shah, A House on Joshi Lane, 2013

Charmi Gada Shah, A House on Joshi Lane, 2013. Image Credit: http://vadehraart.com/exhibition/viewDetails/109/3161

Charmi Gada Shah, a Mumbai based artist shows the underlying beauty in the undervalued and the forgotten to the audience through her aesthetic lens . Her solo show, titled “Neighbourhood Souvenirs”, includes work that can be defined as ‘architectural sculptures’, painstakingly created with construction debris around her Mumbai neighbourhood; salvaged wood, concrete blocks and plaster.

Charmi Gada Shah, Interior of an Abandoned Room, 2013

Charmi Gada Shah, Interior of an Abandoned Room, 2013. Image Credit: http://vadehraart.com/exhibition/viewDetails/109/3164

“It is a slow process that captures the degradation and loss of a particular time, architecture and lifestyle,” said Shah.

Her innovative re-constructs of broken interiors and once standing architecture, in exquisitely detailed and three dimensional miniature models, reveal untold stories and resonate stories of a forgotten past. Her work powerful in character, emanates the emotion of loss, instigating one to remember and celebrate the rich elements of a lost past.

Charmi Gada Shah, Still Life of a Landscape, 2010

Charmi Gada Shah, Still Life of a Landscape, 2010. Image Credit: http://vadehraart.com/exhibition/viewDetails/109/3167

“A city has its own character and globalization tends to remove these differences and introduce a similitude in the city. My work speaks of this loss of cultural moorings.”

 Sujith SN’s exhibition of watercolors titled “Psalms of an Invisible River” speaks in a dialect of Holbeinesque metaphors and meanings. His large-scale paper works, radiate a poetic and apocalyptic oeuvre. The undercurrent of his work communicates with an audience through the metaphor of an invisible river, as the title suggests. His work is narrative and conveys the underlying message of humanity’s relationship with the world and it’s other inhabitants. The invisible river that the artist illustrates could be any of the hundreds of forgotten and misused rivers that fertilize the Indian soil. His work thus portrays a double-edged metaphor, wherein one can relate it to the people and lives that go unseen and forgotten under the unappealing humdrum of urbanization.

Sujith SN, Psalms of an (In)visible River, 2013

Sujith SN, Psalms of an (In)visible River, 2013. Image Credit: http://vadehraart.com/exhibition/viewDetails/108/3145?pages=1

“For the last two years I have been working on a body of watercolors that examine the concept of ‘what makes a city?’ from a different lens. The river is an important motif because civilizations and urbanization often takes place on the banks of a river. Very often the river changes its color and direction as a result of this so-called civilization,” says Sujith.

Sujith SN, Let a Thousand Flowers Bloom III, 2013

Sujith SN, Let a Thousand Flowers Bloom III, 2013. Image Credit: http://vadehraart.com/exhibition/viewDetails/108/3155?pages=1

Both the artists bring forth the notion of reviving a forgotten grey past and provide the audience with a lens to see perspective and beauty in the hidden and undervalued.

Sujith SN, Testimony, 2012

Sujith SN, Testimony, 2012. Image Credit: http://vadehraart.com/exhibition/viewDetails/108/3152?pages=1

Charmi Gada Shah has acquired her Bachelors in Fine Art from the Raheja School of Art in Mumbai, and further pursued her masters in Fine Arts at The Chelsea School of Art in London. She is the recipient of the ‘Promising Artist Award from Art India and India Habitat Centre in 2009. She currently lives and works in Mumbai.

Sujith SN has acquired his Bachelors in Fine Art from the College of Fine Art, Trissur and Masters in Fine Arts at the Sarojini Naidu School of Fine Art, Performing Arts and Communication, University of Hyderabad. He currently lives and works in Mumbai and Kerala.

The exhibitions are on until September 12. For more information click here.

Convergence: Contemporary Art from India and the Diaspora

January 1, 2014•Art, Collectibles, Photography

Shradha Ramesh summates a curatorial note by Professor Kathryn Myers

New York : “Convergence: Contemporary Art from India and the Diaspora” an exhibition held at the William Benton Museum, University of Connecticut (14 October to 15 December 2013) is visual entourage of Indian Modern and Contemporary art.This exhibit encapsulated a different perspective on Indian art, with artworks dating from 1940’s to the present.

Aptly titled, the oeuvres of fifteen artists with different stylistic rendition converge under one roof. Each one of these artists set out on their own creative expedition to explore a common issue of identity and the continued power of place in the current global scenario. While inquiring the conundrums of identity and place the exhibition walked through a vast expanse of repertoire ranging from photographs to new media.

 

Image courtesy Benton Museum. Convergence: Contemporary Art from India and the Diaspora”, 2013, installation view. William Benton Museum of Art, University of Connecticut.

Image courtesy Benton Museum.
Convergence: Contemporary Art from India and the Diaspora”, 2013, installation view.
William Benton Museum of Art, University of Connecticut.

A combination of emerging and internationally recognized artists adds a new visual narration.The list of artists has stalwarts like Madhvi Parekh, Waswo X. Waswo , Ravi Agarwal, Anupam Sud ,Sanarth Banerjee, Siona Benjamin, Neil Chowdhury, Sunil Gupta, Hanuman R. Kambli, Bari Kumar, Vijay Kumar, Sachin Naik, Annu Palakunnathu Matthew, along with  young emerging artists such as Sujith SN, and Avinash Veeraraghavan, are ensemble of contemporary Indian art. These artists are of Indian origin, of which nine artists are from India and the rest six live and work from United States and London.

 

 

Image Courtesy: Connecticut Suresh Playing Hanuman, from the series A Studio in Rajasthan (2007–present). Black-and-white digital Print

Image Courtesy: Connecticut
Suresh Playing Hanuman, from the series
A Studio in Rajasthan (2007–present). Black-and-white digital
Print

Professor Kathryn Myers’s  passion and love for Indian art and culture that started in 1999, has transpired into a fine curatorial collection at the museum.According to Professor Myers, the concept “ “Convergence” emphasizes  how works of art continue to act as key avenues through which we increase our knowledge of and more fully invest in the world we inhabit.” One can experience this each of their works. Creating a strong link between Indian Art and education Professor Myer’s has played a pivotal role in compiling this collection.  Her collaboration with the William Benton Museum sowed the seeds for the first Indian Modern Art exhibit in 2004 called Masala: Diversity and Democracy in South Asian Art. The exhibit had 250 works of traditional, folk, popular, and contemporary art that filled three gallery spaces of the museum.  While “Convergence” is a contemporary sequel to “Masala” that revisits select work of the collection and also introduces audience to artists.

To Read more Click here