NATURE MORTE | Gauri Gill’s ‘Balika Mela’
Launch of the book by Gauri Gill, with an exhibition of photographs.
About The Exhibit | In 2003 the nonprofit organization ‘Urmul Setu Sansthan’ organised a Balika Mela, or a fair for girls, in Lunkaransar town that was attended by around 1500 adolescent girls from a hundred odd villages spread across Rajasthan. Gauri Gill decided to create a photo-stall for anyone to come in and have their portrait taken, and later receive a silver gelatin print. The stall was in a tent and had a few basic props and backdrops. As Gauri recounts, “Girls came in and decided how and with whom they would like to be photographed – best friends, new friends, sisters, the odd younger brother who had tagged along, teachers, the whole class, the local girl scouts, even a few grandmothers.” She returned at the fair in 2010, with an exhibition of the portraits shot in 2003. Many of the girls portrayed in the pictures were either at the fair or known to those who attended. Upon popular demand, she ended up making more portraits, this time in color. As the critic & curator, Gayatri Sinha, notes this exhibit is “an embodiment of India’s staggered engagement with modernity….The girls perform gender, cross gender, divines, Bollywood, and just themselves, with an interested gaze at the camera.”
About the Book | The book has 72 black-and-white plates and 32 color reproductions, essays by Gill herself and Manju Saran, and is a sumptuous document of Gill’s photo studio set up to take portraits of the predominantly female children and adolescents that attended the fair in remote and rural western Rajasthan. It retails at INR 1500.
Where | Nature Morte Gallery, A 1 Neeti Bagh
When | 15th- 29th September
For more information, have a look at their website | www.naturemorte.com
{Gauri Gill | ‘Kanta’}
{‘Suman and Kalavati’}
RENGE ART | Showing Priyendra Shukla and Rita Sud’s artwork
Rita Sud’s ‘The Shimmering Lotus and more’ | A self taught artist, Rita Sud has been painting for the past 20 years. In this exhibit she uses various mediums to express herself- oil, acrylic, water color & pastels. Her art is a manifestation of her experiences, gathering experiences from nature, human experience and emotion. The result is an explosion of colors- colors of blooming flowers, fluttering of prayer flags, celebration of life and the sheer fun of experimentation.
Priyendra Shukla’s ‘Godhuli’ | Priyendra approaches his subject ‘Godhuli’ with gay abandon in frolicking lines of haphazard movement of strokes, that catch your breath. The rusty bells around the necks create a magical symphony of ethereal sounds.
- Where | Club Aralias, DLF Golf Links, Gurgaon
- When | 15th & 16th of September, 3pm to 8pm
VADEHRA ART GALLERY | Porous
Porous showcases the works of artists Ruby Chishti, Priyanka Chaudhary, Juul Kraijer and Rakhi Peswani. As the title Porous suggests, the exhibition is interested in areas of overlaps where one artist’s practice seeps into and connects with another, even as it focuses on individual practices.
The works of the artists employ an array of mediums- sculpture, architecture, drawing, installation and performance- and the historical, cultural and social contexts and phenomenological experiences of the materials are brought to the forefront.
- Where | Vadehra Art Gallery, D-53 Defence Colony
- When | On view until 5 October, 2012, Monday to Saturday, from 11 am to 7 pm
- For more information have a look at their website | www.vadehraart.com
{Juul Kraijer | ‘Untitled’}
{Ruby Chisti | ‘Atlas’}
{Priyanka Chowdhury | ‘Goat Eater’}
NATIONAL GALLERY OF MODERN ART | ‘Project Cinema City: Research Art and Documentary Practices’
To commemorate 100 years of Indian Cinema, NGMA & the Ministry of Culture are organizing ‘Project Cinema City’, which captures the relationship of cinema and cities- the twins of 20th century. Put together by Majlis, an interdisciplinary arts initiative, in collaboration with Design Cell and the Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute of Architecture {KRVIA}, the exhibit has been curated by filmmaker Madhusree Dutta and artist Archana Hande.
The post colonial cities, the vast metropolises and the moving people of the region have evolved a certain discipline which is as much about city narratives as about a distinct cinematic representation. Today, both city and cinema are sites of aspiration that shape, reflect and even alter each other- and this exhibit captures that. The interdisciplinary project engages with issues of labour, imagination, desire, access, spacing and locations, iconisation, materiality, language hybridity, moving people, viewing conventions, hidden processes and so on.
- Where | NGMA, Jaipur House
- When | Till the 23rd of September, from 10am to 5pm, closed on Mondays
- For more information have a look at their website | www.ngmaindia.gov.in
{Mukhopadhyay, Kausik, and Sakalker, Amruta, Bioscope; Courtesy of Cinema City and the artists}
KIRAN NADAR MUSEUM OF ART
Established at the initiative of the avid collector Kiran Nadar, KNMA {Kiran Nadar Museum of Art} exhibits Modern and Contemporary works from India and the subcontinent. Its core Collection highlights a magnificent generation of 20th century Indian painters from the post-Independent decades and equally engages the disparate art practice of the younger contemporaries.
Their current exhibit is CROSSINGS: Time Unfolded II, and has been curated by Roobina Karode. ‘Crossings’ plays on the paradox of permanence and transience. In concept, it engages the contemporary through the constant experience of radical disjunctions, the precariousness of positioning, questioning the stability of spatial and temporal realities. Crossing the line of chronology, the exhibition intends to create room for imaginary conversations and unexpected togetherness between art across generations.
The exhibit features works by L.N. Tallur, M.F Husain, Sudarshan Shetty, Surendran Nair, Anish Kapoor, and Subodh Gupta amongst others.
- Where | KNMA, 145 South Court Mall Saket
- When | On till 31st December, from 10:30pm to 6:30pm, Closed on Mondays
- For more information, have a look at their website | www.knma.in/
{Subodh Gupta | ‘Cheap Rice’}
{S.H. Raza | ‘Saurashtra’}
