State of the Art

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Posts tagged with Photography

Autobiografia: Recluse of History

August 9, 2013

Ipshita Sen of Saffronart previews an exhibition at Gallery Art & Soul in Mumbai

New York: The exhibition, Autobiografia: Recluse of History, is an intriguing group show of artists from different eras. Simplistic and powerful, it stimulates one’s historical chord through classic drawings of soldiers during World War I, with titles such as ‘le commencement de la peur’ / ‘the beginning of fear’ made by artist Jean Louis-Forainto, striking drawings of the town of Lodz by the cubist artist Felicia Pacanowska, a survivor of World War II and the holocaust.

Additionally, the exhibition features works by artists such as Prabhakar Pachpute, depicting open cast mines in India and photographs and scriptures of a theater founded by artist Amol Patil’s father for the Bombay mill workers.

The exhibition is a sneak peek into history, portraying several autobiographies which span an ambitious timeline of significant historical events and offer varied nuances of their respective periods of time. The visitor is thus exposed to several time capsules simultaneously.

A self portrait by Felicia Pacanowska

A self portrait by Felicia Pacanowska

Artist Felicia Pacanowska was a Cubist artist born and raised in the industrial town of Lodz. Her parents were artists too, and part of the large Jewish population in Lodz. The city became an important hub for the Nazi’s occupation owing to its industrial attributes. The Lodz ghetto, the second largest after the Warsaw ghetto, was built for Jews and Romans in German ruled Poland. The ghetto served as an industrial center for the Jews, a gathering point and also as a manufacturing center for German army supplies. Very few Jews survived the dreadful holocaust. Felicia Pacanowska lost her family in the holocaust leaving her depressed. Until the end of the war, she lived in fear and in brutal conditions. Most of her works of art and tools were lost. She, however, continued her diligent work, which eventually staved off her depression. Pacanowska’s significant body of works displayed at the exhibition mainly comprises portraits in studied, clean, scalpel-succinct pencil strokes.

Shernavaz Colah, another artist showcased in this exhibit, has an intriguing series of drawings titled “it-so-ur-sco-pop-hob-ia”, an anxiety instigated whilst being stared at by other people. The exhibition also includes reproductions of works of art by reclusive Sri Lankan artist Justin Daraniyagala, who Shernavaz Colah had been researching.

Justin Daraniyagala, a cubist artist, part of the Sri Lankan avant-garde 43 Group, preceded several of his contemporaries in India in interpreting cubism through his own aesthetic eye. John Berger, a distinguished British writer and art critic, reviewed Justin Daraniyagala and his group and spoke of their outstanding practices. He noted: “…the story of the [‘43] Group’s attempt to achieve a synthesis between the work done in Paris by Picasso and Matisse and the ancient tradition of Sigiriya (frescoes)  which yet took into account the emerging power and equality of Asia in the contemporary work could be discovered through a careful, chronological study of their work.”

The exhibition also includes the works of Zarina Hashmi, Yogesh Barve, Poonam Jain, Akbar Padamsee, Salvador Dali, Prabhakar Barwe, F.N. Souza, Nikhil Raunak, George Braque, A.A. Raiba, Sachin Bonde, Francisco Goya, Mangesh Kapse and Carla Montenegro, with reproductions by M.F. Husain, Pablo Picasso and Fernando Botero.

The exhibition is currently on view at Gallery Art & Soul in Mumbai, India.

The Sovereign Art Foundation and Prize

December 14, 2012

Medha Kapur of Saffronart shares a note on The Sovereign Art Foundation and its esteemed Prize

The Sovereign Art Foundation Established in 2003, The Sovereign Art Foundation is a registered charity in Hong Kong and the United Kingdom. The Foundation works with M’Lop Tapang, Kalki Welfare Society, Kids Company, and many more charities and funds to raise money to help disadvantaged children using the arts as rehabilitation, education and therapy. The Foundation was set up by Howard Bilton, a tax lawyer who turned his art-collecting hobby into the Foundation, which also runs what is now Asia’s largest art prize. Howard is also the chairman of The Sovereign Group.

The Foundation annual Sovereign European and Asian Art Prizes give recognition to some of the most important artists of our time. They essentially invite established artists to enter the competition which carries a first prize of US$ 25,000. All artists that enter the competition are judged by a panel of art experts, and the longlisted 30 show their work at an exhibition. The announcement of the prize winner is made during the exhibition or at the Foundation’s charity auction dinner. A US$ 1,000 Public Prize is also awarded by the Foundation based on votes cast by the public at the exhibition or through the Foundation’s website.

In 2011, the Sovereign Foundation launched the Sovereign African Art Prize which aims at raising public awareness about African art, offering recognition and opportunity to African artists, and raising significant funding for charities in Africa.

Sarnath Banerjee

Sarnath Banerjee
Lalbazaar Detective Department: Lower Pile

Sarnath Banerjee is an Indian graphic artist who has made it to the top 20 of the Sovereign Asian Art Prize this year. His artwork at the Foundation is mainly text and image based, with the intention of simplifying complex systems chiefly to understand them. In the process, he brings levity and emotional depth to otherwise incomprehensible subjects. You can vote for Sarnath Banerjee on the Foundation website, and read an earlier interview with him on this blog here. 

Miguel Payano Sha-Boy

Miguel Payano
Sha-Boy
Winner of the 2010 Public Prize
Image Courtesy http://www.sovereignartfoundation.com

JeongMee Yoon The Pink Project II - Lauren & Carolyn and their Pink & Purple things

JeongMee Yoon
The Pink Project II – Lauren & Carolyn and their Pink & Purple things
2011 Sovereign Asian Art Prize Winner
Image Courtesy http://www.sovereignartfoundation.com

Halim Al-Karim - Witness From Baghdad 1

Halim Al-Karim (Iraqi, b. 1963)
Witness From Baghdad 1
Image Courtesy http://www.sovereignartfoundation.com

Dayanita Singh – The Adventures of a Photographer

November 30, 2012

Medha Kapur of Saffronart shares a note on Dayanita Singh, one of India’s most influential photographers

Mumbai: An artist best known for her photographs, Dayanita Singh lives and works in New Delhi and now also is partly based in Goa. Born in 1961, Singh attended the National Institute of Design in Ahmedabad and the International Center of Photography in New York. Most of her works are in black-and-white, though of late she has also delved deeper into colour photography. Singh is best known for her portraits and interior views of Indian domestic life, especially urban middle and upper class families. Her works have been exhibited extensively, including galleries in Rome, New York, Berlin, London, Milan, Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, and Boston.

Singh has a deep understanding, creating unimaginable images and continuously reinventing her photographs, in the way that language reinvents words. Her works include a photographic series documenting the tabla maestro Zakir Hussain, and Ladies of Saligao, a series in which she photographed women from the village in Goa where she lived. Another significant series is Singh’s documentation of her close friend, Mona Ahmed. Singh photographically mapped Mona’s intimate life, her adopted daughter, her banishment from the community of eunuchs she belonged to as a result of her alcoholism, and her eventual illegal activities in a cemetery, for a period of 13 years.  Singh has documented several other subjects as well, tracking their complex and difficult lives, and developing symbiotic relationship with them, as well as with the medium of photography.

Zakir Hussain (1986)

Zakir Hussain (1986)
Image courtesy http://www.dayanitasingh.com

MYSELF, MONA AHMED (2001)

MYSELF, MONA AHMED (2001)
Image Courtesy http://www.dayanitasingh.com

Singh has published nine books of her photographs: Zakir Hussain (1986), Myself, Mona Ahmed (2001), Privacy (2003), Chairs (2005), Go Away Closer(2007), Sent a Letter (2008), Blue Book (2008), Dream Villa (2010), Dayanita Singh (2010), and House of Love (2011) . The Adventures of a Photographer, an exhibition of her work currently on view at the Bildmuseet in Sweden (till 13 January, 2013) comprises works from the last twelve years of her career: dreamlike landscapes, cityscapes and industrial nightscapes saturated with intense colour, along with carefully executed black and white images of people and interiors such as her renowned portraits of Indian upper-middle-class families and her latest project File Room.

The exhibition Dayanita Singh / The Adventures of a Photographer is curated by Katarina Pierre, Director Bildmuseet, assisted by Polly Yassin.

Remembering Prabuddha Dasgupta

August 15, 2012

Josheen Oberoi on the artist and photographer Prabuddha Dasgupta

New York: Prabuddha Dasgupta passed away on August 12, 2012 of natural causes. He was in his late 50s. A beloved photographer in India, he was internationally renowned for his commissioned fashion photography, but had, in fact, straddled the worlds of fashion and fine art photography for decades, one of the few to have done so with his level of acclaim.

Prabuddha Dasgupta
Francis and Bobby D’Souza in their Bedroom, Parra, Goa, 2006
Archival digital print on paper, 18.5 x 27 inches
Image courtesy Saffronart

Prabuddha Dasgupta was a self-taught photographer and first hit Indian national consciousness with the publication of his book Women in 1996, featuring portraits and nudes of Indian women. This publication came decades after he was already well established and revered as a photographer in the fashion and advertising industries. More recently, he published Edge of Faith (2009), comprising seventy nine intimate portraits of the Catholic community in Goa.

I had the pleasure of working with Prabuddha at his first personal showing in New York in 2007, for his body of work Longing. This series was also written about in the Paris Review. The show was a narrative of memories and experiences, with the artist allowing us a glimpse of intimate fragments of his life and experiences. These images, like most of his recognized work, were monochromatic; his mastery over the nuances of black and white being unparalleled.

Prabuddha Dasgupta
Untitled, 2005
Print on paper, 14.0 x 20.5 inches
Image courtesy Saffronart

What I took away most from my experience working with him, beyond his obvious artistic genius, was his tremendous humility. He had a degree of graciousness that is rare to encounter, in both his professional and personal interactions, and he will be sorely missed.

You can read more about him in the personal recollections of his colleague Pablo Bartholomew here. A couple of the many obituaries published over the last few days can also be read here and here.

Homai Vyarawalla at the Rubin Museum of Art

August 6, 2012

Josheen Oberoi on Homai Vyarawalla’s retrospective at the Rubin Museum of Art, New York

New York:  Homai Vyarawalla (1913 – 2012) was India’s first female photojournalist and played a pivotal role in documenting India’s political history from the 1940s through 1970. Candid: The Lens and Life of Homai Vyarawalla, an exhibition of her photographs and related ephemera, opened at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York City on July 6 and is the first solo showing of her work in the United States. Unfortunately, she was not able to attend this exhibition, as she passed away in January at the age of 98. Vyarawalla was widely eulogized in India and abroad, including in the New York Times. Her presence as the first woman in a nascent profession like photojournalism (as it was in 1940s India) has often framed the discussion about her importance in India’s history. But her iconic status is equally deserved by her command over her craft, as is evident in the exhibition.

Installation image of Candid: The Lens and Life of Homai Vyarawalla
Photograph by David De Armas
Image Courtesy: Rubin Museum of Art, New York

The exhibition is organized thematically in clusters ranging from three to six images, around her personal photography, photojournalistic career post 1942, and commercial freelance work documenting the social life of Delhi in the late 1940s. Entering the exhibition space, we are first welcomed by a showcase that holds Vyarawalla’s two favorite cameras – the Roleiflex and Speed Graphic Pacemaker – most commonly used at that time. The solidity of these cameras (in stark comparison to the sleekness of digital cameras today) immediately establishes the tone of the exhibition, setting us up for a trip down memory lane. This is further enhanced by the immediacy of viewing the medium of gelatin silver prints in the exhibition.

The first set of photographs is from the 1930s, when Vyarawalla lived in Bombay and was a student at the Sir J.J. School of Arts. These predate her political photojournalism and capture everyday and mundane scenes in Bombay. These images are personal, subjective records of Vyarawalla’s Bombay – of VT Station, her classmate Rehana Mogul, and an expressive image of a monsoon-threatened Marine Drive. Many of these images were published in the weeklies of that time, particularly the Illustrated Weekly of India. Her later commercial work in Delhi chronicles the more elite social life of a city that was the center of politics in the 1940s. Two of these prints of parties at the Delhi Gymkhana Club have been included in the show. Out of this ‘non-political’ work, an exceptional photograph in the show is Fox Hunt. Shot in Delhi in the 1940s it is a moody, impressionistic take of a cold foggy morning in the city. Self-described as her favorite, this image exemplifies Vyarawalla’s ability to capture the atmosphere in which the moments she documented took place, suggesting a narrative instead of a sterile moment.

A Fox Hunt in Delhi led by Col. Sahni, Early 1940’s
Gelatin Silver Print
From the exhibition: Candid: The Lens and Life of Homai Vyarawalla
Collection: Alkazi Collection of Photography
Image Courtesy: Rubin Museum of Art, New York

Mohammad Ali Jinnah at his last Press Conference before leaving for Pakistan; August 1947
Gelatin Silver Print
From the exhibition: Candid: The Lens and Life of Homai Vyarawalla
Collection: Alkazi Collection of Photography
Image Courtesy: Rubin Museum of Art, New York

This is true of her political photography as well. Vyarawalla moved to Delhi with her husband Maneckshaw, also a photojournalist, in 1942 where they were employed by the British Information Services. Her political photojournalism began with the end of the Second World War and India’s path to independence in the mid-1940s that are represented in the exhibition through images like her portrait of Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Present at seemingly every major event of the time, the next cluster of images is of the funeral and cremation of Mahatma Gandhi in 1948. These include intimate images of the Mountbatten family and Gandhi’s funeral procession.

The ashes of Mahatma Gandhi being carried in a procession, Allahabad; February 1948
Gelatin Silver Print
From the exhibition: Candid: The Lens and Life of Homai Vyarawalla
Collection: The Alkazi Collection of Photography
Image Courtesy: Rubin Museum of Art, New York

The display then moves to Vyarawalla’s favorite subject: Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first Prime Minister. His pervasive presence in her photographs over his seventeen years in office underline this, and offer an organic portrait of him as a public figure – in jest, relaxed, caught in a lonely moment of exhaustion, and in his interactions with the many foreign dignitaries that visited India, his famed charm and charisma visibly occupying the frame.

Prime Minister Nehru waiting for a dignitary to arrive at the Red Fort; 1950’s
Gelatin Silver Print
From the exhibition: Candid: The Lens and Life of Homai Vyarawalla
Collection: Alkazi Collection of Photography
Image Courtesy: Rubin Museum of Art, New York

Dr. Helen Keller, who was calling on President Dr. Rajendra Prasad at the Rashtrapati Bhawan, being greeted by, Prime Minister Nehru who had come to see her; 1955
Gelatin Silver Print
From the exhibition: Candid: The Lens and Life of Homai Vyarawalla
Collection: Alkazi Collection of Photography
Image Courtesy: Rubin Museum of Art, New York

Ho Chi Minh, President of North Vietnam being escorted by Pandit Nehru and Dr. Rajendra Prasad; 1958
Gelatin Silver Print
From the exhibition: Candid: The Lens and Life of Homai Vyarawalla
Collection: Alkazi Collection of Photography
Image Courtesy: Rubin Museum of Art, New York

The public figures that visited independent India were also extensively photographed by Vyarawalla. I found this selection of images and their curation in the exhibition particularly strong. They document the ethos of India as a nation immediately after independence. From Nehru’s playful interaction with Ho Chi Minh, at an otherwise grave political meeting, to meetings with Dr. Helen Keller, President Eisenhower, the Chinese Premier Chou En-lai in the days that the slogan ‘Hindi Chini Bhai Bhai’ was echoing around the country, all these feel like historical records of a new, exultant nation and the role it predicted for itself in the world.

Vyarawalla’s eye almost always caught these figures in unguarded moments of ease, and her portraits lack the stiffness of predictable posed photographs.

An image particularly relevant to contemporary India is of the Dalai Lama’s first visit in 1956. This was three years before his final, permanent escape to India and it is telling of her journalistic instinct that Vyarawalla chose to travel to Sikkim to photograph this occasion.

The Dalai Lama in ceremonial dress enters India through a high mountain pass. He is followed by the Panchen Lama, Sikkim, India; 1956
Gelatin Silver Print
From the exhibition: Candid: The Lens and Life of Homai Vyarawalla
Collection: Alkazi Collection of Photography
Image Courtesy: Rubin Museum of Art, New York

What is striking in Vyarawalla’s works is that the perspective she chose in all her images is appropriate to the moment, be it the intimate framing of Mahatma Gandhi on his funeral pyre or the low angle shot of Nehru releasing a dove, making him larger than life. There is also a marked lack of sentimentality in her compositions as a press photographer. She had an ability to maintain distance and still capture the personalities of the subjects and the events. This made viewing her photographs an engrossing experience, allowing me to create portraits of the time she lived in and captured.

In addition to her photographs, there are two other treasure troves in this exhibition. A showcase that spans the breadth of the gallery includes Vyarawalla’s contact prints from the 1940s through 1970. Also her press cards, hand colored Illustrated Weekly covers, invitations and thank you notes from the political figures she photographed – this case builds an image of the cultural life of Delhi during those years. Another gem is an excerpt from a documentary on her, directed by Anik Gosh and supported by Sparrow, where she is interviewed by Sabeena Gadihoke, her biographer (India in Focus: Camera Chronicles of Homai Vyarawalla, Mapin/Parzor, 2006) and a collaborator on this exhibition. Sprightly and undiminished, Vyarawalla speaks freely – on her beloved cameras, her courteous male colleagues of yore, the remarkable integrity of that time and most importantly, her method. She says, and I paraphrase, that there was no time to focus. ‘We had to put our distance, fit the picture and just click’.

This exhibition is presented in collaboration with the Alkazi Foundation for the Arts, New Delhi, and will remain on view till January 14, 2013. A larger retrospective of Vyarawalla’s work was held in 2010-2011 at the National Gallery of Modern Art, in New Delhi and Mumbai. A rare opportunity to view these images in person in New York, the show is definitely worth a dekko. Located in the museum’s Theater Level Gallery, admission to it is free of charge, a fact the show’s curator Beth Citron said Homai Vyarawalla would especially have been pleased with in an earlier interview with Saffronart.