Reflections of contemporary India
dal 20/10/2008 al 3/1/2009
Segnalato da
20/10/2008
Reflections of contemporary India
La Casa Encendida, Madrid
Sheela Gowda, Amar Kanwar, N S Harsha and Anup Mathew Thomas
La Casa Encendida, part of Caja Madrid's social work, presents the exhibition Reflections of contemporary India. India is a plural, immense country with a huge population. A country that cannot be simply defined by the inexhaustible wealth of its different traditions, or by the contrast of diverse levels of reality. And the art scene in India is a reflection of this, inevitably rich and diverse.
Reflections of contemporary India shows the work of four Indian artists, focussed on analysing the world around them. Their work marks a meeting point between the contemporary languages of art and the inward gaze, in the dissonance where religious and cultural traditions and modernity occupy the same space. The journey of these four creators builds an evocative collage of the complex, essential experience of Indian society. The selection is the result of the field work of Luisa Ortinez, the curator of the exhibition. She spent over two years in India, visiting artists in their studios, getting to know the reality which shapes them and researching the country's art scene.
The perspective of Sheela Gowda (Bhadravati, 1957), Amar Kanwar (Delhi, 1964), N S Harsha (Mysore, 1969) and Anup Mathew Thomas (Kochi, 1977), opens our eyes through their different disciplines – installation, video, painting and photography – to important issues in the Indian society of today, such as the friction caused by the rapid transformation of urban and rural areas by increased economic growth, or the shocks and contrasts between tradition and modernity. Other conflicts also appear in their works, universal in today's world, such as violence, cultural identity, emigration, gender issues and globalisation. The European viewer has an opportunity to see the world from the perspective of a society that is geographically distant, but which will play an increasingly important role in the century of contradictions which is now beginning; a society which can already be seen on the streets of many of our cities. The work of these artists expresses the complexity of their cultural and political environment, while offering a vision far removed from the aesthetic stereotypes built around this ancient country.
The show is supplemented by four videos made in India from 2006 to 2008 by Luisa Ortinez about each of the artists taking part. The documentary videos give us a privileged insight into their working methods, linked together by conversations with the artists, revealing the different contexts and human landscapes which produced them: documents which reveal their universes and their creative processes.
Image: Anup Mathew Thomas
La Casa Encendida
Ronda Valencia, 2 28012 Madrid
Espacio D y E.
Free entrance