Art SG

curatorial note

As with its history, trade, and culture, so with its art, India has always stood at the crossroads of assimilation, adaptation, change, and experimentation. Ancient and medieval art practices have informed her artists in the 20th century—a point when European and Asian movements found acceptance before being turned into a vibrant lexicon that has remained central to the pursuit of art in the subcontinent.

‘India Modern’ provides a glimpse of this vital uniqueness. The selection of artworks represents different periods and genres spread across 20th-century India, ranging from the figurative to the abstract. Rooted in Indian aesthetics and contexts, they are, nevertheless, international in their appeal. The selection includes names of artists who are well known, and not just in India—stalwarts such as F. N. Souza, M. F. Husain, and S. H. Raza; global icons such as Natvar Bhavsar and Avinash Chandra; Indian masters such as G. R. Santosh, Sohan Qadri, Laxman Pai, J. Sultan Ali
and Shanti Dave; landscape artists Bireswar Sen and Gopal Ghose; and women artists such as Gogi Saroj Pal, Shobha Broota, and Madhvi Parekh.

This medley of artists represents the exciting world of the moderns in India with a body of work that is serious as well as playful, formal as well as liberated from the constraints of academic art, and richly layered with a civilizational past that provides it with depth and substance. Taken together, this is a celebration of Indian modern art at its finest.