NEWS
A Time to Dream
Apparao Galleries, presents a show titled, ‘A Time to Dream’ at the Sandy’s, Chennai. the show focuses on the works of two artists, Farhan Mujib and Pradeep Nerurkar, inviting the viewer to ponder on the concept and power of dreams.
Dreams have been the precursors and answers to many a problems, also as inspirations to artists, writers, philosophers and thinkers for centuries. The show encourages the viewer to delve deep within themselves and find out what their dreams have presented to them individually.
The show is on view from 13th March to 14th May 2014.
India Song
Most images are a collage of stunning architecture across Rajasthan, Delhi and Hampi, photographed, which is scanned and digitally combined with photographs of animals. Knorr transfixes the viewer with her surreal views, peppering her work with considerations of caste, femininity and how they relate to the animal world.
The show is on view till 19th March 2014.
The Nanyang Spirit
The show is on view from 12th March to 21st March 2014.
A Tree from my backyard
Depicting the intersection of diversity from a global scenario, the artist blends and presents small scale works and large scale ones as well. this incessant influencing, tends to dilute the original and there is a shift in the equilibrium.
Trying to visualise the lost traditional with the popular and the so called new, the artist bridges the gap with his works and thoughts of time and movement.
The show previews on 14th March and is on view till 27th March 2014.
(News reports by Sushma Sabnis)
(Report sourced from Mumbai Boss)
A Time to Dream
The show is on view from 13th March to 14th May 2014.
India Song
 |
| ( Work byKaren Knorr) |
Piramal Gallery of National Centre for the Performing Arts, Mumbai presents British photographer Karen Knorr’s four-year-long Deutsche Börse Photography Prize nominated ‘India Song’ at the new Tasveer show. It features images from Rajput traditions, taking inspiration from the cultural and wildlife heritage of India besides fables from Panchatantra, and references to orientalist appropriations of Indian culture, as well as the personification of animals seen in folklore.
The show is on view till 19th March 2014.
The Nanyang Spirit
 |
| ( Work on display) |
Art Spice Gallery, at the Metropolitan Hotel, New Delhi presents a show titled, ‘The Nanyang Spirit’. The twenty two Singaporean artists, each with a unique style of painting, are all representatives of the ‘Nanyang’ spirit.
Having grown up in Singapore during the developmental period, some of these artists have experienced the tensions between tradition and modernity, enabling them to incorporate these elements into their painting styles. Such is the essence of the ‘Nanyang’ spirit. In these ‘Nanyang’ artists express their personal unique painting styles in their artworks, often through a blend of multiple stylistic techniques of the East and West, resulting in a varied body of works unified by their focus on Southeast Asian subjects.The show is on view from 12th March to 21st March 2014.
A Tree from my backyard
 |
| ( Work by Arunanshu Chowdhury) |
Tao Art Gallery, Mumbai presents a solo show of art works by artist Arunanshu Chowdhury.
The show titled, ‘A Tree from my backyard’ features the works by the artist which focus on the amalgamation of cultures, people and where the idea of origin is lost in this give and take.Depicting the intersection of diversity from a global scenario, the artist blends and presents small scale works and large scale ones as well. this incessant influencing, tends to dilute the original and there is a shift in the equilibrium.
Trying to visualise the lost traditional with the popular and the so called new, the artist bridges the gap with his works and thoughts of time and movement.
The show previews on 14th March and is on view till 27th March 2014.
(News reports by Sushma Sabnis)
FEATURE
Krishen Khanna On Painting At Night, Drawing With His Eyes Closed And The Modern Cannibal
 |
| (Artist Krishen Khanna) |
“To this day it makes me wonder how a small lead point peeping out of a pencil can yield so much,” writes Krishen Khanna in his handwritten concept note accompanying his ongoing solo show A Celebration of Lines at Sakshi Gallery. In Khanna’s case, the yield is a body of drawings and canvases dating back over 40 years, encompassing his minimalist experiments with Japanese woodcuts and his gory vignettes of ghoulish cannibals, and harking back to a childhood spent in Lahore and being witness to the violence of Partition. The 88-year-old Khanna, who quit a career in banking and joined the Progressive Artists’ Group at the behest of M. F. Husain, his friend and fellow painter, spoke to us from Gurgaon about painting at night, drawing with his eyes closed and sleeping at the early hour of 11pm. Edited excerpts:
In your concept note you say, “Sometimes I even close my eyes and let the point roam”. Is there a work in the show that started from that point?
No, I don’t think so. I’ve used this methodology many times in the past as well. It doesn’t become evident though, it gets scrubbed out, I go over it and use what I need. It’s a combination of the unconscious and the conscious mind.
No, I don’t think so. I’ve used this methodology many times in the past as well. It doesn’t become evident though, it gets scrubbed out, I go over it and use what I need. It’s a combination of the unconscious and the conscious mind.
You have a lovely work of an old lady called “Bye Bye Miss Amery”. Who was she?
She was an old Brit who lived in Lahore. She used to teach English and was employed by my father to teach my mother English. My mother was very young, my father was considerably older and more educated. She was a regular in the house, and used to come three times a week to teach English. She (Miss Amery) was a big, fat, old lady, she melded into the sofa she was sitting in, so you couldn’t very well distinguish where her clothes ended and the sofa began. She was an amusing woman and very proper.
She was an old Brit who lived in Lahore. She used to teach English and was employed by my father to teach my mother English. My mother was very young, my father was considerably older and more educated. She was a regular in the house, and used to come three times a week to teach English. She (Miss Amery) was a big, fat, old lady, she melded into the sofa she was sitting in, so you couldn’t very well distinguish where her clothes ended and the sofa began. She was an amusing woman and very proper.
There are a series of drawings of ghoulish cannibals, one shown plucking the eyeball of another. What inspired these works?
Well, current situations, where people are eating people, that was about three years ago. Periodically I venture into this kind of horrific drawing which nobody is going to buy, but that doesn’t matter. These are metaphorical drawings of what is going on today in many ways. There’s a depletion of love, and increase in the variety of hate.
Well, current situations, where people are eating people, that was about three years ago. Periodically I venture into this kind of horrific drawing which nobody is going to buy, but that doesn’t matter. These are metaphorical drawings of what is going on today in many ways. There’s a depletion of love, and increase in the variety of hate.
 |
| ( Selection of a Target) |
Could you tell us a little more about the work of the man peeping out from a tree (see image, at left)?
This was apropos of the assassination of Saunders, who everyone said was shot by Bhagat Singh. Of course it was a whole lot of people who did it. [In this work] there’s this chap in the tree, he’s photographing the cavalcade which used to past underneath my window. I saw this fellow, and I asked the chap looking after me, who is this fellow and he said he’s just bird watching. Later on it dawned on me, he wasn’t watching birds, he was looking for a target. This was in Lahore.
How do you spend your day?
I do get up early to start painting, the evenings I spend doing drawings. I go to bed relatively early, around 11pm. I used to go to bed much later than I do now. All these drawings were done more or less in the evenings. I used to read a lot. The thing is I read a lot of poetry. I still remember a lot of poetry, and the poetry I remember I don’t need to read, I verbalise it to myself. The various images from the poems, things I’ve seen, they all meld and work together in an image, which I then might be interested in painting and drawing.
I do get up early to start painting, the evenings I spend doing drawings. I go to bed relatively early, around 11pm. I used to go to bed much later than I do now. All these drawings were done more or less in the evenings. I used to read a lot. The thing is I read a lot of poetry. I still remember a lot of poetry, and the poetry I remember I don’t need to read, I verbalise it to myself. The various images from the poems, things I’ve seen, they all meld and work together in an image, which I then might be interested in painting and drawing.
Do you still paint at night as you used to do with M. F. Husain?
We used to have night sessions in a little studio. I’d be painting, he’d break off and say, ‘You carry on painting, I have to say my prayers’. I was painting, and he was saying his prayers in this tiny little studio. Those were very happy times. Night is a wonderful time to work, no disturbance, no telephones. Of course I was much younger then.
We used to have night sessions in a little studio. I’d be painting, he’d break off and say, ‘You carry on painting, I have to say my prayers’. I was painting, and he was saying his prayers in this tiny little studio. Those were very happy times. Night is a wonderful time to work, no disturbance, no telephones. Of course I was much younger then.
(Report sourced from Mumbai Boss)
