Art Work l Artists l About Exhibition
“Qadri creates dots and lines that are scratched out on paper. Dot with its endless possibilities, the first point in meditation. From here the world and energies expand. Dots and lines gouged in color revealing a spontaneous flow of his hand”.
Sohan Qadri (B.1932)
Sohan Qadri was born in Punjab and completed his formal education at Punjab University in 1946. He was initiated in yoga, tantra, dance, and music by Guru Bhikham Giri and completed his M.F.A from Govt. College of Art, Simla, 1960.
He held over forty one-man shows in important galleries in New Delhi, Bombay, Nairobi, Zurich, Vienna, Brussels, London, Munich, Basel, Hannover, Cologne, Copenhagen, Oslo, Stockholm, Montreal, Toronto, Ottawa, Los Angeles, Koszalin (Poland) and Tampere (Finland).
His works have been a part of many solo as well as group shows in India and abroad, including Between Ambivalence and Criticism, Art Konsult, New Delhi, 2010, Masala Diversity and Democracy in South Asian Art, The William Benton Museum of Art, Storrs, 2004, etc.
He is the recipient of the National Award, Lalit Kala Akademi, 1968. His works are among the collections of Ajit Mukherjee, Heinrich Böll, Hitachi Capital Collection, Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum.
He died in the year 2011.
“I realised that to be an artist, one has to go beyond mirroring reality and only through developing an extremely personal language, and one can generate new forms and meaning for the world”.
Shridhar Iyer (B.1961)
Shridhar Iyer served as a member of the panel of adjudicators in various State and National institutions. He has been a recipient of many chief State and National Awards and has received a Junior Fellowship, HRD, New Delhi.
Iyer has exhibited his whimsical artwork in fifteen solo shows, three installations (Homage to animals Bhopal, Homage to animals New Delhi, Homage to animals Chandigarh, Triguna Bharat Bhavan Bhopal, Dream House Bospacia Kolkata, Imaging Sai (Swayambhoo) Art Positive Gallery New Delhi), five films (Blue Bull Grey, On the way New Delhi and around 200 group exhibitions in India and abroad.
He has also been a dynamic participant in collecting folk and tribal art from Madhya Pradesh for Roopankar Museum of Fine Arts, Bharat Bhawan, Bhopal, and the southern region for Festival of India in Japan.
LIVES AND WORKS IN NEW DELHI.
“Each painting subsumes multiple elements together just as each moment bears connection with the past and the future and yet the reality is a single frame, inside a sole composition”.
Prabhakar Kolte (born in 1946)
Prabhakar Kolte is an Modern & Contemporary painter who was born in Nerurpar, Maharashtra. In 1968 he completed his diploma from Sir J.J School of Arts, Mumbai, where he served as a faculty member from 1972-1974.
He has held several solo shows in Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, and New Delhi. His work was featured in numerous exhibitions at key galleries and museums.
His works have been a part of several solo shows and group exhibitions like ‘Art- Mosaic- Celebration of Calcutta’s Tercentenary, Calcutta and Mumbai, 1990, etc. Kolte also exhibited at ‘Six Indian Painters’ curated by Geeta Kapur at Toto grad, Yugoslavia, Ankara and Istanbul, 1985, ‘Three Artists’ Hong Kong, 1995 and Gallerie Foundation for Indian Artists, Amsterdam, 1996.
LIVES AND WORKS IN MUMBAI
“As per my imagination, paradise cannot possibly exist in an increasingly crowded Earth. Today, existence without this extravagance is not possible. And yet, we strive in this golden-age, that palatial component that acts as the elixir of life. I want to bleed out the colours of my palette into manifestations of the life of a metropolis.”
Kalicharan Gupta (B.1947)
Founder of Kali Group, Haryana, Kalicharan Gupa Born in Punjab now in Haryana (India), studied at the Jamia Millia Islamia New Delhi, College of Art, New Delhi and Kanpur University.
He has held several group shows and solo group shows. His work has been showcased in Several shows in India and Korea. Nominated as Commissioner of South Asian Countries and worked under National Museum of Contemporary art, Seoul, Korea 2006. He participated in the ’95 Kwangju First International Biennale, Korea 1995.
His works are in the collection of Lalit Kala Akademi, NGMA New Delhi, Govt. Museum and art gallery, Chandigarh.IFFCO, TATA.
LIVES AND WORKS IN NEW DELHI
“painting is not a dialogue or a conversation, but a communion with colour”.
Achuthan Kudallur (B.1945)
Achuthan Kudallur was born in the Palghat district of Kerala. He holds a diploma in Civil Engineering, moreover, to start out he wanted to be a writer. Later, the canvas and its colors drew him towards serious painting. The artist grew up in an atmosphere charged with Gandhian values, the writings of Ramakrishna, and Vivekananda.
His values and views are well depicted in some of his paintings, which are a joyous, riotous spread of colors. And yet, some are melancholic, even tragic. For Achuthan, painting is not a dialogue or a conversation, but communion with color.
His works display a remarkable economy of style and grace. His paintings are of a non-figurative style and the medium he uses is oil. Achuthan’s art is exciting, energetic, yet tranquil. Besides being rated as one of India’s topmost artists, Kudallur has a huge collection of portraits and illustrations for his own stories, which have been published in prominent fortnightly magazines.
A recipient of the National Academy Award and Tamil Nadu Lalit Kala Akademi Award, the artist is a widely traveled person. Apart from sixteen solo shows all over India, sponsored by major art galleries and institutions, he has been part of most important juried and curated group exhibitions, such as Sotheby’s India sale in London, New South Delfina Gallery, London, Homage to Arthur Rimbaud in India and France, and Heart Intuitive Logic Exhibition.
He has had several institutional commissions including Air India, Mumbai. His works are in several private and institutional collections like the National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi, Air India, Glenberra Museum, Japan, and other collectors in India and abroad.
LIVES AND WORKS IN CHENNAI
“I am no connoisseur of art,Neither do I claim to make any head or tail out of abstract art”.
Dashrath Patel (B.1927)
Born in Sojitra, Gujarat, Dashrath Patel studied fine arts at Government College of Fine Arts, Chennai (1949–53), where Debi Prasad Roy Choudhury was his mentor. He studied painting, sculpture, and ceramics during his Post Graduate studies at École des Beaux-Arts, Paris (1953–1955).
The influence of French Impressionism gave way to a conscious exploration of abstract, sometimes geometrical motifs from the middle period of his career onwards. He practiced in diverse art fields as a painter, ceramist, graphic designer, industrial design, and exhibition design.
Early in his career, he was a contemporary of Tyeb Mehta, M.F. Hussain, and V. S. Gaitonde who were together in the 1950s in Bhulabhai Desai Institute, Mumbai, and often exhibited alongside them. Later Henri Cartier-Bresson introduced him to photography after the former visited his exhibition at the Galerie Barbizon, Paris.
He remained the secretary of the National Institute of Design (NID) from 1961 to 1981. During the last decade of his life, he worked from Alibaug, near Mumbai, where the Dashrath Patel Museum now houses his multidisciplinary oeuvre.
He was awarded the Padma Shri by the Government of India in 1981, followed by the Padma Bhushan, posthumously in 2011.
He died in the year 2010
“There is a gradual transformation from the earlier rigid geometry to fluid forms full of inner energy explored with lines and colors”.
S.K. Sahni (B.1937)
S.K. Sahni received a Govt. Diploma of Art (Paintings) from the Sir J.J. School of Art Mumbai (1996), followed by Bachelor’s Degree from Delhi University in 1970 and Master of Art (Drawing & Painting) from Meerut University in 1977. Later he completed a Postgraduate diploma in Museology from M.S. University, Baroda. Sahni worked in the National Children’s Museum, National Bal Bhavan, New Delhi (1962-72) and at the National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi (1973-95); he retired as its Keeper (curator) in 1995.
He has held 20 solo exhibitions, including ‘Linear Explorations’, curated by E. Alkazi at Art Heritage, New Delhi (2007), ‘Symphony of Straight Lines’ (2009) and ‘Space A to Z’ (2013) at Shridharani Gallery. A retrospective exhibition of his works (1962-2014) was held at AIFACS Galleries in 2016, and he has shown at India Art Fair in 2018.
Among his many awards, Sahni has received the Junior (1991-94) and Senior Fellowship (1996-98) from Ministry of Culture, India, the National Exhibitions Award AIFACS 1996, 1998, and 2005, as well as the Sahitya Kala Parishad Award in 1999. His works have also been shown internationally, including the Museum of Geometric Art, Texas, USA, and been featured in the publication “Journey of the Straight Line” by Dr. S.S. Bhatti. S.K. Sahni’s works are in many prestigious collections in India and abroad such as National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi; Government Museum & Art Gallery, Chandigarh; The Alkazi Collection of Art and the Osian Foundation.
LIVES AND WORKS IN DELHI
“My total attention is to capture the essence of things through my visual perception and my art is not about imitation it is about creation”
Mahesh Jagtap (B.1981)
Born in Bhaur, Aurangabad, Maharashtra, Joined Sir J J School of Art, Mumbai and accomplished BFA in Drawing and Painting (2005) and MFA in Creative Painting (2010). He has held several group shows in Singapore, Indonesia, Mumbai, and Delhi. He has participated in a number of solo shows and camps
Received many awards and Scholarship from J J School of Art and in the year of 2018 received Maharashtra State Award from Prafulla Dahanukar Art Foundation, His Excellency the Governor of Maharashtra Award & Medal from the Bombay Art Society in the year 2010 and S.H.Raza Foundation Award in the year 2006.
LIVES AND WORKS IN MAHARASHTRA
“After my Kandinsky´s study it became clear to me to search spirituality in art which was very strong in me to follow as my path.”
Mahirwan Mamtani (B.1935)
Born in Sindh (at that time British India and now Pakistan) after the partition of India in 1947, migrated to Delhi. Bachelor of Arts in Political Science in 1955. Studied Painting at the Delhi Polytechnic, New Delhi and received the National Diploma in 1962. Awarded DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) to study painting at the Academy of Art, Munich under Prof. Franz Nagel in 1966, since then living in Munich and Issing.
Mahirwan Mamtani is part of the Neo-Tantra Art group initiated by Dr. L.P. Sihare – exhibited with artists: Biren De, G.R. Santosh, Sohan Qadri, Proffula Mohanti, Haridasan, Om Prakash and P.T. Reddy in many Museums in Germany and USA. He is also a part of the artist group, The Spiritual In Art, initiated by Dr. Walter Schönenberger (Lugano/Milano) – Domenico Caneschi, Italy – Pietro Gentili, Italy – Guy Harloff, France – Joerg Anton Schulthess, Switzerland – Nora Ullmann, Israel.
In the 60s, he was inspired by TANTRA ART and in the 70s by Kandinsky. Then came across several constructivist/concrete artists in Germany
LIVES AND WORKS IN GERMANY.
“By leaving my works untitled I give viewers an opportunity to make an effort at interpreting them, on their own terms and feel gratified in the process”.
Nupur Kundu (B.1975)
Born in New Delhi, Nupur Kundu specialized in Fine Arts from the College of Arts, New Delhi, achieved Sangeet Bhaskar in Indian Classical Dance (Kathak) from Chandigarh University and has performed on stage for eighteen years.
She has been exhibiting her abstract works at national and international platforms for two decades. She has had a number of solo and group exhibitions since 1996, featured in India Today Magazine’s 30th Anniversary Issue amongst 30 young successful achievers turning Thirty (December 2005). She is a Board Member on DPS School Sirsa and WCD Committee (WCD) of the PHD Chamber of Commerce.
Nupur is a recipient of the Indira Gandhi Priyadarshini Award for Fine Arts, 2008, and received the Junior Fellowship, Ministry of Culture, Government of India, 2011-2013. She is the recipient of the Rajiv Gandhi Excellence Award for the Best Contemporary Artist of the Year 2014. Also honored with Indian Council for UN Relations Award in the field of Fine Arts, 2015.
LIVES AND WORKS IN NEW DELHI
“My work is an expression of nature in abstraction”.
Virender Singh (B.1991)
Born in New Delhi, Virender Singh is an emerging artist, he completed his Bachelor’s of Fine Art (2016) and Master’s of Fine Art (2018) in sculpture from College of Art, New Delhi.
He held his first solo show at Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi in the year 2018 and one group show in Pullman hotel New Delhi in the year 2019. Besides this he participated in several art exhibitions and camps.
A recipient of Merit Award in Kalanand Art Contest 2017, By Prafulla Dahanukar Art Foundation and Second award for best student in M.F.A sculpture (2018) department by College of Art. His works are in the collection of Reserve Bank of India, Heritage art gallery in Triveni Kala, New Delhi, Sanchit art gallery and Subharti University
LIVES AND WORKS IN NEW DELHI
“…Whatever may be the medium, as far as beauty is concerned, it all has its own beauty”.
Anil Kumar (B.1993)
Born in Uttar Pradesh, completed his Bachelors and Master’s in sculpture from College of Art, New Delhi. He has done several group exhibitions since 2015 in New Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Baroda, Kolkata, and Chandigarh. He took home bronze in the all India online exhibition by 27 Art Point. His work is in the collection (2019) of Mr. Ravi Dhariwal Chief Editor The Times of India.
LIVES AND WORKS GHAZIABAD
