Search results for: 'Books on the visual history of modern Indian art'

The art of the twentieth century may be too recent for us to judge it from the viewpoint of longevity, but if the past is any criterion, art is set to outlive us by far—a reason why its documentation is one of the more important tasks before us. This is where the Manifestations series is so important. It encourages discussion and debates around the selection of unique works by seventy-five acknowledged artists spanning a century (or more) of Indian modernism across a range of variously permutable combinations: periods, movements, mediums, materials, regions.  Raiba Ambadas Arpana Caur Arun Bose Asit Kumar Haldar Avinash Chandra Bal Chhabda Bikash Bhattacharjee Bimal Dasgupta Biren De Bireswar Sen C. Douglas Chittaprosad Devayani Krishna Dhanraj Bhagat Dharamnarayan Dasgupta Early Bengal (Anonymous) F. N. Souza G. R. Santosh Ganesh Pyne Gogi Saroj Pal Himmat Shah Indra Dugar J. C. Seal J. Sultan Ali J. Swaminathan Gaganendranath Tagore Raja Ravi Varma Jamini Roy Jeram Patel Jyoti Bhatt K. Adimoolam K. C. S. Paniker K. G. Subramanyan K. H. Ara K. K. Hebbar K. Laxma Goud K. S. Radhakrishnan Kalighat Pat (Anonymous) Khagen Roy Krishen Khanna L. Munuswamy Laxman Pai Laxman Shrestha M. F. Husain M. Senathipathi M. V. Dhurandhar N. S. Bendre Nandalal Bose Navjot Nemai Ghosh Nikhil Biswas P. Khemraj P. T. Reddy Paritosh Sen Partha Pratim Deb Prokash Karmakar Prosanto Roy Rabin Mondal Rabindranath Tagore Radha Charan Bagchi Ram Kumar Ranbir S. Kaleka Robert Ker Porter S. H. Raza Sakti Burman Satish Gujral Shanti Dave Shyamal Dutta Ray Gopal Ghose Sohan Qadri Sunil Das Sunil Madhav Sen Thota Vaikuntam Ved Nayar

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For its debut participation in the modern section of Art Dubai 2017, DAG focussed on the unconventional theme of Neo-Tantra as a way of bringing India’s unique school of abstraction to global attention. The booth featured works by two of the country’s leading practitioners of this school—G. R. Santosh and Biren De. The stunning, colour- and energy-filled canvases drew all eyes towards itself, making it the singularly most-visited booth in the section.

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Continuing its theme of introducing Indian abstractionists at Art Dubai, DAG handpicked works by eight eminent abstract artists and juxtaposed them to bring into focus how brushwork and colour are imbued with emotion and can compel viewers to spend hours studying such works. The artists presented by DAG at Art Dubai 2018—Ambadas, Sohan Qadri, Natvar Bhavsar, Avinash Chandra, Rajendra Dhawan, Shanti Dave, Ram Kumar and S. H. Raza—worked in different styles but their use of vivid colours highlighted this somewhat neglected genre of art in India that has begun to enjoy a premium in recent years. These artists had their studios in different parts of the world—Copenhagen, Oslo, New York, Paris, London, New Delhi—but had one thing in common: they were all of Indian origin and had trained and begun their careers in India. AMBADAS SOHAN QADRI NATVAR BHAVSAR AVINASH CHANDRA SHANTI DAVE G. R. SANTOSH J. SWAMINATHAN RAM KUMAR JERAM PATEL RAJENDRA DHAWAN K. V. HARIDASAN

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Manifestations VI features an assortment of seventy-five significant artists curated from its collection. Not organised around theme or style, Manifestations features a single work or a related series of works by each chosen artist, which reflect an important facet of their unique artistic journeys. Usually dominated by 20th century modern Indian art, Manifestations VI features works spanning three centuries, from a ‘Company Painting’ set in Tirunelveli district, Tamil Nadu, done by Thomas Daniell for the East India Company in the 1790s, to an Early Bengal work of a ferocious Kali astride a supine Shiva, to several 20th century modern works. A A. Raiba Ambadas Amitava Anonymous (Early Bengal) Asit Kumar Haldar Avinash Chandra Amitava N. Arya Benode Bihari Mukherjee Bikash Bhattacharjee Bimal Dasgupta Biren De Bireswar Sen Charan Bagchi Chintamani Kar Chittaprosad P. Roy Chowdhury Dharamnarayan Dasgupta F. N. Souza G. R. Santosh Ganesh Haloi George Keyt Gopal Deuskar Gopal Ghose Gulammohammed Sheikh Himmat Shah Indra Dugar J. P. Gangooly J. Sultan Ali Jamini Roy Jeram Patel Jyoti Bhatt Jogen Chowdhury K. C. S. Panicker K. K. Hebbar K. Laxma Goud K. S. Kulkarni Khagen Roy Kshitindranath Majumdar Laxman Pai M. A. R. Chughtai M. F. Husain M. F. Pithawalla M. V. Dhurandhar N. S. Bendre Nandalal Bose Nikhil Biswas P. Khemraj P. V. Janakiram Paritosh Sen Pestonji E. Bomanji Prodosh Das Gupta Prokash Karmakar R. Vijaiwargiya Rabin Mondal Raja Ravi Varma Ram Kumar Rameshwar Broota Ramkinkar Baij Ranbir Singh Kaleka Rasik Durgashankar Raval Radha Charan Bagchi S. H. Raza Satish Gujral Shanti Dave Shobha Broota Shyamal Dutta Ray Sohan Qadri Somnath Hore Suhas Roy Sunil Das Thomas Daniell Tyeb Mehta V. Nageshkar V. S. Gaitonde V. Viswanadhan

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Have you wondered how people looked at paintings and photographs in the nineteenth century? For DAG’s annual Heritage Festival ‘The City as a Museum’, we explored various aspects of the city’s visual culture. As we are about to launch the DAG Journal let us revisit the walk co-led by Sarbajit Mitra and Amreeta Das at the Uttarpara Jaykrishna public library to delve into the periodical archive and trace the evolution of printed pictures in India. Flipping through the pages of these periodicals offered glimpses into the everyday habits of consuming art—from simple wood-cut and lithograph illustrations, to full plate colour reproductions of paintings and photographs, artist albums, and exquisitely ornate typography.

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DAG invited leading historians of Delhi, Swapna Liddle and Rana Safvi, to explore our archives collection. The items they found there include numerous photographs of the three durbars, taken by prominent photographers of the day. They also include many other objects relating to the durbars, from portraits and medals, to maps and official guidebooks, and to tickets and programmes. Historians in the past have analysed the ideology of the Delhi durbars, but never before has such a collection of the material culture of these events been brought together for display.

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'Iconic Masterpieces of Indian Modern Art, Edition 2' opened on 11 February, featuring fifty artworks which shaped the trajectory of pre-modern and modern art in the country. As part of the exhibition, Shobhaa De explores the confluence of European academic style and Byzantine art in Jamini Roy’s ‘Madonna and Child’. Learn More

Twenty years after India’s independence, Films Division, the government’s documentary and propaganda filmmaking body, was seeking to re-invent itself. It had the mandate of recording the nation’s history on film. It was also a project of moulding the citizen through films that were screened in cinema theatres, before the entertainment feature. The films covered varied subjects from development, self-reliance, social issues, to art and culture, making them an invaluable archive of the Indian state’s record of the nation’s history as a modern, progressive nation. The films remained largely unpopular, like homework, among the unwilling audience of people who waited for the entertainment film to follow the documentary. Learn More

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He was the colossus of the Indian art world whose reign over twentieth-century modern art remains unparalleled. M. F. Husain (1913-2011) was the face of Indian modernism and owned it completely. Having started out as a painter of billboards in Bombay, he became its unchallenged monarch as a member of the influential Progressive Artists’ Group in 1947. He claimed the first National Award instituted by the Lalit Kala Akademi in 1955, and went on to become India’s most celebrated artist. In a practice that spanned over seventy years, Husain was playful, experimental, provocative, controversial—but never mediocre.

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Art Lab by DAG’s Museums Programme is a pop-up art exhibition of facsimiles of works from the DAG Museum Collection that travels to schools and introduces students to modes of visual learning. After two successful iterations in CBSE and ICSE schools in Kolkata, Art Lab travelled to its first Bengali medium West Bengal Board school—Barisha Janakalyan Vidyapith for Girls. Through three days of workshops spread across two weeks, the students interacted with the artworks, learnt the basics of research, delved into historical material, and developed their own creative projects. Take a peek at some of the wonderful projects they curated as they took over the exhibition and made it their own.

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‘Iconic Masterpieces of Indian Modern Art, Edition 2’ opened on 11 February at DAG’s Janpath Gallery in New Delhi featuring fifty artworks which shaped the trajectory of pre-modern and modern art in the country. As part of the exhibition, Manisha Parekh recalls her memory of her mother Madhvi Parekh as an artist working within spaces of familial intimacy.

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