Exhibition, NGMA New Delhi - 16 January - 06 March, 2016
Two years after contemporary artist Subodh Gupta' retrospective — the first contemporary Indian artist to have had a retrospective at NGMA, (besides Kapoor in 2013) — Artist Sudarshan Shetty is to present a body of new work at the National gallery of Modern Art in Delhi. The exhibition opens on January 15 and will run for three months.
It is a "consecration" to the Mumbai artist who will this year also serve as artistic director of the Biennale of Kochi.
The artist is represented by the Sunitha Kumar Emmart’s GALLERYSKE, Daniel Templon in Paris and Brussels, and works with the Krinzinger gallery.
The work draws on a poetic work by 12th century poet Gorakhnath who also influenced his celebrated successor Kabir. These poetic traditions populated their verses with the concrete symbolism of the built world and things within it, with references to nature and the environment as metaphors for the body and its beyond.
The film involves building and construction alongside characters enacting scenes in which drama mobilizes conventions of representing birth, death, dance, play, music and violence in local traditions of story-telling.
Sudarshan Shetty (b. 1961) is a leading contemporary artist living in Bombay. His practice encompasses painting, drawing, installation, video/ film and sculpture. He has exhibited widely both in India and internationally. Recent solo shows include Galerie Daniel Templon, Brussels (2015), GALLERYSKE, Bangalore (2015), GALLERYSKE, New Delhi (2014), Galerie Krinzinger, Vienna (2012).
Recent major group exhibitions include; Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, New Delhi (2015), Europalia, Liege (2013-14), Kochi Muziris Biennale,Kochi (2012), Centre Pompidou, Paris (2011) and Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2010). He has an upcoming project at the 20th Bienniale of Sydney, Sydney (2016), curated by Stephanie Rosenthall. Sudarshan Shetty was recently appointed as the Artistic Director and Curator of the 2016 edition of the Kochi Muziris Bienniale.