Etched in Stone: Revisiting the working life of Anupam Sud

Anupam Sud is one of India's foremost printmakers. Educated at the influential Delhi College of Art by mentors like Jagmohan Chopra and Somnath Hore, Sud is also known for innovating on the process through photographic interventions that can be attributed to her own personal relationship with the medium.

She is the recipient of the 2025 Asia Arts Vanguard Award. The Asia Arts Game Changer Awards are organised by Asia Society India Centre to honour innovation in contemporary South Asian art practices; the Vanguard award recognises senior visual artists who have pioneered contemporary art with their practices and have been educators, scholars or mentors to other artists, influencing generations of young practitioners and students of visual culture in India. She spoke to the editor of the DAG Journal about her trajectory in art.

Q. You went to the Delhi College of Art in the 1960s and became a member of Group 8, focusing on printmaking. How did your early mentors like Somnath Hore and Jagmohan Chopra inspire you?

Anupam Sud: When I was in college, going through that typical training phase as a student, there were always certain people who left a lasting impact on me. Somnath Hore was not teaching any of my classes—he only taught senior ones. By the time I reached the senior classes, he had resigned and moved to Santiniketan. But both he and Jagmohan Chopra would often drop by our classes. All of us students would work on sketches, and I still have a special fondness for pencil drawings, those raw pencil sketches. Every Saturday, the college had a programme where we had to show our sketchbooks. Most people were drawing landscapes—trees, plants, that sort of thing. But I was always drawing human figures from my imagination. Somnath Hore, even though I did not know him well or realise how significant he was as an artist, took a liking to my work. He never called me Anupam; he’d always say, “Anupali, ladki kahan hai? Tumhara sketchbook dikhao” (‘Where is that Anupali girl? Show me your sketchbook’). People were a little intimidated by him because he was very strict.

Somnath Hore, Untitled, Etching on handmade paper, 5.2 x 7.2 in. Collection: DAG

Mr. Chopra, on the other hand, took care of everything for us—whether it was our drawings or anything else. In our junior classes, we were only supposed to focus on lithographs, so that is how I learned lithography from him. The person working with us on that was a Maulana Sa’ab, who was incredibly skilled with the technique. He had previously worked for Urdu printing presses and had his own method for processing the lithographic stones.Later, Mr. Chopra taught us that by applying certain chemicals, like Arabic gum, the stone would become resistant and other techniques. I learned the technical side from the Maulana, as he was extremely proficient in it; but the drawing and the deeper explanations came from Mr. Chopra. He always made me feel like I was special. It’s not that the others were not, but most of my classmates came from Modern School and very well-off families, so they were more aware and refined in many ways. For me, it was a great experience, and Mr. Chopra was my mentor.

Our course was a five-year diploma program, and by the time we reached the third year, we had to start focusing on etching and similar techniques. I asked Mr. Chopra how we could continue working with these mediums once we left college, as most of them cannot be done outside due to their environmental impact—they’re toxic, and households can't handle it, it’s dangerous for the air. He said I got him thinking. After the summer vacation, in our fourth year, he designed an etching machine himself. He found anyone interested in continuing the work and formed a group called Group 8. Back then, it was common for people to number their groups, such as Group 1890, but I’m not sure if it was coincidence or something deeper. Mr. Chopra was into numerology. He would often calculate people’s birthdates and tell them what they should do to succeed as artists.

Now, we had no space outside the college to work on our own projects, so Mr. Chopra transformed his drawing room into a printmaking workshop for us. He was also supporting his family—his brothers, sisters, and their education. I’m not even sure how he managed it, with so many of us in the group. They sacrificed so much for us. I learned that while women can be very considerate, men can be incredibly demanding. Mrs. Chopra, who was also a member of Group 8, hardly ever got time for herself because someone would always ask for tea or coke. We all had to contribute towards the materials, but the senior male members rarely did. We would bring in paper, supplies, and other materials, and they would happily use them without contributing a single penny. This created problems and challenges, yet we continued on. I joined the group right after I graduated from college, so for me, it was incredibly useful because it gave me a space to work—until I received a British Council scholarship.

Q. How did you decide to focus on printmaking—a demanding method at the best of times—as the core of your practice?

Anupam: I can’t say I was actively trying to become a printmaker, but you know, sometimes life takes you down paths you least expect. I was quite good at portrait painting. So, when I saw printmakers with their dirty hands and faces, surrounded by mosquitoes, I thought, ‘This is something I would never do’. Nowadays, I never allow my students to work without an apron, but back then it wasn’t mandatory. You could either do printmaking or murals, and I chose murals. I had read The Agony and the Ecstasy, and the idea of painting on a ceiling like Michelangelo seemed so romantic to me. I wanted to experience that. But it’s hard work. The plaster doesn’t just fall on your face—it falls on your hair, your glasses, everywhere. And as you do it, you wonder how others managed the same thing; and how much they must have pushed their own limits. Back then, I wore a very strong pair of glasses and plaster would fall right onto them. Every six months, my father would take me to the doctor for new glasses. I realised he was sacrificing his work time to take me, and that’s when I decided to switch to printmaking instead. So it wasn’t exactly a choice; it was more a compulsion brought on by my circumstances.

In my final year, Mr. Somnath Hore left. Due to the ongoing war with China, copper and zinc plates became hard to find. You could not buy them openly. Mr. Chopra, being very inventive, always found ways around problems. He read extensively—everything from physics and chemistry to gardening. He was knowledgeable about nearly everything, which naturally made him quite influential in the college. He always looked for cheaper alternatives to expensive artistic materials and processes, often finding solutions in American books. One of the things he taught us was how to make plates from cardboard and create surfaces that mimicked more traditional etching techniques. He also introduced us to a material called nitric cellulose putty, which is resistant to water and is used for fixing dents on cars. As long as we could use it, we could continue drawing and simulate the effects of etching as closely as possible. You could cut the cardboard into pieces and arrange them like puzzles, giving us a lot of creative freedom. It was not a costly medium, but it was very effective and allowed us to work quickly. These were some of my earliest works. I used them to create a portfolio, which I then took to the British Council. My goal was to go and learn traditional printmaking, a practice that had been thriving in Western countries for centuries. When I got to London, it completely transformed my career.

Q. Examining gender relations obviously take a central place in your work, for some of the reasons you have outlined earlier. What are your thoughts about this?

Anupam: You know how people in this country perceive the idea of freedom in different ways, right? But coming from a middle-class family, my problems weren’t as severe. The only real concern was my weak eyesight, which led some to think I should just get a basic education and marry young.

But then, fate led me to printmaking and the world of art. I went to London, then France, and wherever I travelled, I saw things that changed my perspective. When I returned, I had a new mission—I saw things in a different light, and I was eager to share these ideas with Mr. Chopra. We were working on building a studio with very limited funds, but it eventually became highly proficient at the College of Art.

Anupam Sud, Infiltrators, 19.2 x 38.7 in. Etching and aquatint on handmade paper, 2007. Collection: DAG

In college, both male and female models would pose naked, and I always felt that male bodies were more beautiful because they showcased the definition of muscles. Back then—I'm not sure how it is now—unfortunately, many women from very poor backgrounds would come to model. Their bodies were more organic, raw in a way. At home, I would see my mother, who was very fair and delicate, while I was darker in complexion. My teacher would point out the rhythmic lines in the female form, but I found it difficult to grasp. I had never seen women from poor backgrounds standing naked like that before. These are the things I noticed, and they shaped my perspective as a woman.

As a child when I asked my father if I could step outside to observe the night sky, or the shapes of trees in the darkness, he would object or suggest I find someone to accompany me. It is that very experience, unique to a woman, that I have tried to capture in my work.

Q. Can you tell me a little bit about your relationship with photography?

Anupam: Mr. Chopra was an avid photographer and believed that everyone should learn about the medium. So, he introduced photography classes at the College. It became part of the Applied Art course, and he even started teaching it to printmaking students. I’m from Shimla, where photography studios were quite common, and my father was also passionate about it. We even had a photography shop in Connaught Place, Delhi. Since everyone around me was involved in it, I naturally got into it too.

Mr. Chopra’s knowledge of photography was so vast that I learned a great deal from him—about apertures, shutter speed, and the art of experimenting with the medium. By the time I went to London, I already had a solid understanding of these techniques. Photography was a huge deal in London at the time, especially because not everyone could draw. I was fortunate to have learned photo processes on plates and the proper use of chemicals. Mr. Chopra always encouraged me to learn whatever was necessary for my creative process.

When you look at someone’s drawing, you can often tell whose work it is—it’s like a stylistic signature. I have that too. I wanted to create very impersonal, structural spaces, for housing fonts; so it made sense to use the photo process, which allowed me to combine two languages in one—both visual and textual.

Q. What role did a larger artistic community play in the shaping of your creative identity?

Anupam: In the West, you read about the different artistic movements that emerged from various groups and communities, such as Impressionism or Expressionism. In India, however, modernism has become the all-encompassing term used to describe most of our artistic endeavours. This broad term sometimes leads to philosophical detours that don’t always align with the goals we were trying to achieve. Colonialism instilled a sense of inferiority in our minds, which ultimately shook our faith in our own cultural traditions. I often feel envious of our musical tradition, which has managed to preserve much of its uniqueness. The sawal-jawab format, where musicians perform in a back-and-forth dialogue, improvising on well-known signatures, is such a beautiful thing to witness.

I learned a great deal from attending shows abroad, particularly from performance artists in America and Japan. While I did not know how to apply those methods in our own context, I was still fascinated by them. After seeing so many works in these different settings, you begin to develop a sense of what resonates with you and what doesn’t—this, in turn, helps you refine your own vision.