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sitanshi talati-parikh

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Category Archives: Art, Literature & Culture

A Fine Thread

12 Thursday Feb 2015

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Art, Literature & Culture, Brand Watch, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Art and Design, Louis Vuitton

Published: Vervemagazine.in March 2015

Espace Louis Vuitton Art

How does a weave become a work of art? Not just in beautiful clothes, or in theGodharis of Maharashtra exhibition, but in the way Espaces Louis Vuitton celebrates new and contemporary artworks using the medium of thread. The Espaces of Munich, Paris and Tokyo have been powered with an exhibition that lasts the first half of 2015.

Curated by Michiko Kono, eight international artists take part in the group show, Le fil rouge which translated means ‘the red thread’. Each Espace showcases the work of four of the eight artists, referencing the theme and the other artists’ works in a three-way dialogue. The series opens with embroidery-based works in Munich to site-specific installations in Paris and ends with a summary of the theme in Tokyo.

Referencing the images from the gallery above, Japanese artist, Chiharu Shiota’s work is an installation of lightbulbs suspended in space and entangled by thread, switching on and off; exploring her interest in life and death. Italian artist, Tatiana Trouvé’s installation of 250 suspended plumb lines hovering barely above ground level struggling (and failing to) achieve a vertical stance – suggest the indecipherability between the absurd and the rational, the possible and the unimaginable. In his new film, the Belgian Hans Op de Beeck, employs puppets exploring contemporary society’s complexities and universal questions of the meaning of life and mortality. His film, The Thread, will be shown at all three Espaces. The other artists are Ghada Amer, Tracey Emin, Isa Melsheimer, Michael Raedecker and Fred Sandback.

The release note remarks: ‘Unlike pencil and paint, thread is not linked to an intrinsic finality, and its materiality encourages infinite artistic expressions and explorations. Replacing the brush, thread in contemporary art is embroidered or glued onto the image carrier, and combined with paint. Canvas fragments are sewn together using thread. By stretching lengths of yarn at different scales and in varied configurations, it is employed to form sculptures, trace lines in space, reproduce architectural principles or seemingly suspend the laws of physics.’

It is essential to go back to thread as an art form, rather than a means to a fashionable end. To question the abstract nature of the medium and it’s physical place in society is to give it perspective and suggest relevance. It is also an emphatic way to revisualise the medium and possibly be inspired to suggest creative renditions that may change the face of fabric tomorrow.

Le fil rouge is showing at Espace Louis Vuitton München (Maximilianstraße 2a, 80539) until April 11, 2015; at Espace Louis Vuitton Paris (60, rue de Bassano, 75008) until May 3, 2015; and will be on at Espace Louis Vuitton Tokyo (Louis Vuitton Omotesando Bldg. 7F 5-7-5 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku) from April 8 to May 31, 2015.

The Art of Stillness

12 Thursday Feb 2015

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Art, Literature & Culture, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Books

Published: VerveMagazine.in February 2015

The Read The Art of Stillness – Adventures In Going Nowhere
Author Pico Iyer
Publisher TED Books

The back story Iyer’s father called him a “pseudoretiree” when he left his Manhattan job for the backstreets of Kyoto. And it was. according to him, the best move he ever made. Says Iyer in the book: ‘I couldn’t blame him; all the institutions of higher skepticism to which he’d so generously sent me had insisted that the point of life was to get somewhere in the world, not to go nowhere. But the nowhere I was interested in had more corners and dimensions than I could possibly express to him (or myself), and somehow seemed larger and more unfathomable than the endlessly diverting life I had known in the city….’

Iyer’s book is a way to snap into the reality of the world you are inevitably sucked into, and a simple solution to finding your peace while living in it, without having to move geographically: ‘Sitting still as a way of falling in love with the world and everything in it….’ 

What we loved It hits the pulse of what’s missing for people swamped with technology today. It resonates deeply and it’s evocative and moving words in their sheer simplicity ring true long after you have put it away. So you can’t actually put it away. As TED books likes to put it, these are “small books, big ideas,” and as a quick read with reverberating depth, it really works. 

What else? You want more of Iyer’s writing. 

More take-aways

‘More and more of us feel like emergency-room physicians, permanently on call, required to heal ourselves but unable to find the prescription for all the clutter on our desk.’

‘…not many years ago, it was access to information and movement that seemed our greatest luxury, nowadays it is often freedom from information, the chance to sit still, that feels like the ultimate prize.’

‘Heaven is the place where you think of nowhere else.’

‘Our (writers) job is to turn through stillness, a life of movement into art. Sitting still is our workplace, sometimes our battlefield.’

‘As with any love affair, the early days of a romance with stillness give little sign of the hard work to come.’

‘You don’t get over shadows inside you simply by walking away from them.’

‘The one thing that technology doesn’t provide us with is a sense of how to make the best use of technology.’

Dance For A Man

12 Thursday Feb 2015

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Art, Literature & Culture, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Arts and Culture

Published: Vervemagazine.in February 2015

Last month, a legend passed away. A man that danced for the people, but with gay abandon, precision and humour. Born in Calcutta, he was one of the finest performers of the North Indian style of Kathak with a contemporary twist. A maestro of virtuosic footwork and compelling storytelling, he can be most admired for his own innovation, Kathak Yoga (simultaneously dancing, singing and often, playing an instrument) which went on to become a doctoral dissertation at Harvard University. He is also remembered for bringing international rhythm to local art, with the ‘India Jazz Suites’ (‘Fastest Feet In Rhythm’ in India) with Emmy award winning tap dance star Jason Samuels Smith, recently made into a documentary, Upaj.

Calcutta Roots Das’ parents founded Nritya Bharati, one of India’s first institutions for dance.Growing up in his parents’ dance school in Calcutta, he was surrounded by literary artists, poets, dancers, and gurus of the times.With encouragement from his mother, Das began his study of Kathak at age 9, schooled in both major Kathak traditions, embodying each in his artistry: the graceful and sensual elements of the Lucknow school combined with the dynamic and powerful rhythms and movements of the Jaipur School. Das, a child prodigy, attained national fame, performing at age 11 and was brought to America in 1970 on a Whitney Fellowship to teach Kathak at the University of Maryland. He subsequently taught at the Ali Akbar College of Music, Stanford University and founded the first university accredited Kathak course at the San Francisco State University.

American Living He made Kathak an intrinsic part of the Indian diaspora in America with the Chhandam School of Kathak and the Chitresh Das Dance Company in California (1980).

In 2006, Chitresh Das and Chhandam organised a festival of Kathak dance in San Francisco, the largest Kathak festival ever to take place outside of India; it brought together Kathak dancers from all over the world. In 2009, Pandit Das was awarded the National Heritage Fellowship, the highest honour bestowed on a traditional artist by the US Government. Das received the award, signed by President Obama, at a ceremony at the Library of Congress on Capitol Hill.

Indian Legacy In 2002, he founded Chhandam Nritya Bharati in India. With multiple branches of Chhandam worldwide, Das legacy lives on through his institutes imparting the knowledge of dance as a way of life, a path for attaining self-knowledge and as a service to society.

In a tribute to the maestro, three others take the stage on February 28. Jason Samuels Smith flies down from America while locally, Padma Bhushan awardee Begum Parween Sultana and the director of Chhandam Nritya Bharati (India), Seema Mehta come together in what promises to be an electrifying and touching performance with a unique blend of tap dance, vocals and Kathak.

Seema Mehta: “Guruji has left behind a group of powerful and dedicated women of all ages and races who will be taking his vision and dream forward. I am incredibly fortunate and blessed to have trained directly with him for 15 years. He has given ever so generously and it is now my dharma to take it and share the knowledge and joy with the future generations. Guruji will live through each one of us who will keep his work alive. As he said, ‘his legacy is his after-life’.

Begum Parween Sultana: “I have known him for decades. I’ve had wonderful times with him touring all of south India. It is a great loss to the world. He was the Sadhaka the way he used to perform. His achievement was unparalleled and we cannot seen his magical feet again….”

Catch Rhythm Rewritten on February 28, 2015 at 7pm at the Tata Theatre (Nariman Point, Mumbai).

A Drop In The City

15 Saturday Nov 2014

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Art, Literature & Culture, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Art, Verve Magazine

Vervemagazine.in November 2014

Concerned with water, a deep desire to investigate, immerse and experiment, Atul Bhalla’s show in Delhi is stark and moving

Atul-Bhalla-Chair-in-the-landscape-36-x-53.5-in-Archival-Pigment-Paper-2013

1964-born, Delhi and USA educated, Atul Bhalla is deeply interested in the environment particularly the eco-politics of water. His conceptual art creates an engagement with urban and metropolitan spaces, particularly those in his home city of New Delhi. He is also known as an environmental activist on the basis of his preoccupation with the distribution, regulation, commoditisation and pollution of water – and yet he stays on the right side of social concern. Bhalla describes his practice as an attempt to understand water, the way he perceives it, feels it, drinks it, swims in it and sinks in it. Possibly, with the world losing sight of the water crises, with the immense wastage of natural resources in movements like the Ice Bucket Challenge, it is prudent to have a speaker for the precious resource.

5 Questions with the artist, Atul Bhalla
1. Artistic Motivations “It’s the deep desire to investigate, experiment, immerse, push boundaries and communicate…to say it my way.”

2. Inspirations “Jeff Wall, Francis Alys, Andrei Tarkovsky, Isaac Bashevis Singer, Wislawa Szymborska, Fyodor Dostoevsky.”

3. On the wall at home “Francis Bacon, Giacometti, Gerard Richter, Tacita Dean, Jeff Wall, Francis Alys.”

4. Concerns that find place in your art “Water!”

5. If you weren’t an artist, you would be…“Still an artist!”

Ya Ki Kuchh Aur runs until January 2, 2015 at Vadehra Art Gallery, D-53 Defence Colony, New Delhi.

Does Mass Culture Have Meaning?

10 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Art, Literature & Culture, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Art, vervemagazine

Vervemagazine.in November 2014

2

From an organic site-specific installation by architect-turned-artist, Asim Waqif to an exploration of structure and space through Aditya Pandey’s abstract paintings, Rajorshi Ghosh’s photo montages and video, and Vishal K Dar’s robotic lighting ensembles (crafted out of automotive parts sourced from the grey market), The Science of Speed explores the ‘immersive environment of pictures, objects, lights, colours and sounds.’ The title of the exhibition draws upon French philosopher Paul Virilo’s concept of ‘dromology’, describing how society is referenced by and revolves around mass media, which the philosopher considers to be a form of modern warfare.

Much like their observation of the movement of images in mass media and culture, the artists in the exhibition acquire and recycle images and objects without a reference to the original context or function. Check it out for the ability to step away from a burgeoning digital culture and question the endless consumption of information that after a point becomes seemingly meaningless.

The Science of Speed by Nature Morte is on view at Famous Studios, Mumbai from November 6 to 16, 2014.

Artist Profiles

Asim Waqif Hyderabad-born and New Delhi-based architect-turned-artist, who has had four solo shows in Paris, Delhi and Mumbai. He recently showed at the Marrakech Biennial. He has been associated with many research and development programs in Badrinath, Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh.

Aditya Pande Lucknow-born and New Delhi-based artist has a degree in graphic design from NID-Ahmedabad and has had five solo shows in Mumbai, Gurgaon, London and New Delhi.

Rajorshi Ghosh Calcutta born Ghosh now lives in New Delhi and Ohio, where he teaches at the School of Art at Ohio University. Also an NID-Ahmedabad graduate (Visual Art) he also did his MFA from the University of California-Los Angeles. He’s exhibited internationally, and in received the Jury’s Recommendation Award at the 11th Japan Media Art Festival in Tokyo.

Vishal K Dar New Delhi-born and based artist studied architecture in Gugaon and later did an MFA from the University of California-Los Angeles. He’s exhibited internationally and was awarded the ‘Promising New Artist’ award by the India Habitat Centre (2006).

Ground Space

23 Thursday Oct 2014

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Art, Literature & Culture, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Art, Verve Magazine

Vervemagazine.in October 2014

15 artists showing for over three months at Lado Sarai’s new gallery. There’s no way you can miss Zameen, curated by Ranjit Hoskote

Ranbir-Kaleka.A-panoramic-spectrum

Last year, ArtDistrictXIII opened it’s doors in Lado Sarai, and now they have a group show curated by Ranjit Hoskote with some heavy names in order. Gigi Scaria, who gave Verve ‘frame-able’ art (July 2013) is also present among names like Atul Dodiya, Gargi Raina, Baiju Parthan, Ranbir Kaleka and Jagannath Panda. Titled Zameen, Hoskote admits to the initial reference point of Husain’s Zameen and moves on to establish the various ranges of thought leading to a collection of 15 artists in Lado Sarai: starting from “the processes of gentrification and urban expansion” to “the aura of exile and diaspora.”

The artists have articulated their explorations of zameen through diverse media, ranging from woodcut, paintings, digital prints and installations to finding expression in domains like the blog or graphic novel or “the additive memoir into which a sequence of Facebook posts can develop”. “Taken together, I regard these outcomes – whether manifest or latent, exhibitionary or discursive – as travelling territories of thought,” writes Hoskote in his curatorial essay.

What may we expect?
In the curators words (excerpts):

1. Atul Dodiya and Baiju Parthan engage with the ideological and aesthetic resources of the contemporary Indian subjectivity, the varied pasts from which we in the present may derive critical inspiration rather than inflated pride.

2. Jagannath Panda and Gigi Scaria phrase hymns to despoiled environments and their endangered denizens and silenced mythologies; their paintings gesture towards the syndromes of war and expansionism.

3. Lost homelands preoccupy Veer Munshi and Zarina Hashmi; both artists explore mnemonic forms, Munshi through portraiture and Hashmi through cartography and the symbolic image.

4. Ravi Agarwal shares, with Hashmi, a concern with memories of space once inhabited by family, structured by rituals of kinship and inherited ways of being and making, now disrupted by economic and political shifts. Agarwal also shares, withArunkumar H G, a commitment to critiquing and resisting the toxic industrial threat to agriculture and the environment.

5. Land, in Ranbir Kaleka’s account, is the cumulus of the fantasies, stories, dreams and aspirations of those who inhabit or occupy it. Fantasies of belonging also animate Gargi Raina’s work: she explores sensory memories that modulate our sense of self, working beneath the levels of waking consciousness.

6. Elliptical family memoirs also define Ram Rahman’s work, which is charged with his intense experience of the neighbourhoods he has inhabited in New Delhi and New York. In Ashim Purkayastha’s work, the family portrait encodes the circumstances of oppression and terror that have constrained private life and compromised civil liberties in zones such as North-east India, where the mandate of militarisation often overrides democratic guarantees.

7. Praneet Soi’s work, like Ram Rahman’s, articulates the modes by which a transcultural subjectivity anchors itself in multiple locations.

8. Both Vishwajyoti Ghosh and Ryan Lobo record forms of community emerging within a hyperreal present dominated by metropolitan aspirations: their artistic projects capture the thrum of travelling subcultures, the momentum of societies in fast motion.

Zameen is on show until January 31, 2015 at ArtDIstrictXIII (F-213C, Lado Sarai, New Delhi).

Open Minds

20 Monday Oct 2014

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Art, Literature & Culture, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Art, Verve Magazine

Vervemagazine.in October 2014

What do mind maps and vacuums have in common? Find out in the artistic dialogue between an Indian and American artist in Delhi

Pieter-Schoolwerth

This week in Delhi, a visual dialogue opens between two artists, Avinash Veeraraghavan (Indian) and Pieter Schoolwerth (American), about mapping minds and vacuums respectively.  It’s a bit of a brain twister pushing boundaries of the imagination into mental black holes and mapping the psyche through the collective unconscious and free association. In We do not see things the way they are, we see things the way we are, Veeraraghavan’s fictional maps are conceived as metaphors of the places his mind has seen; while Schoolwerth’s first exhibition in India, My Vacuum Suucks, brings to the table the vacuum of reality.

Through the materiality and liberated signification of We do not see things the way they are, we see things the way we are, Veeraraghavan expresses “delight in the coming together of difference.” Meanwhile, moving images, six paintings and a series of collages depict the “trials and tribulations of presence versus absence in the vacuum space of the world” for New York city based Schoolwerth.

The exhibition is on until December 17, 2014 at GallerySKE (1st Floor Shivam House, F 14 Middle Circle, Connaught Place, New Delhi).

All About Town

14 Tuesday Oct 2014

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Art, Literature & Culture, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Art, Verve Magazine

Vervemagazine.in October 2014

Urban narratives always make for a talking point in art. Field of Vision brings together six artists who expand this dialogue

Shilpa-Gavane1-Clear-4x6

Reports show that jungle animals are beginning to adapt to city life to survive; it is estimated that by 2050, 65% to 80% of humanity will live in urban centres. Field of Vision, curated by Jasmine Shah Varma, brings together six artists whose works feature powerful urban narratives: Anjana Mehra, Gautam Bhatia, Indrapramit Roy, Jaideep Mehrotra, Meera Devidayal and Shilpa Gavane. Their art explores the city in it’s myriad dimensions, its past and present and its metaphorical implications through recognised emblems in various media such as painting, sculpture, mixed media works and photographs.

Catch Field of Vision at Gallery Art and Soul, Worli, Mumbai from October 14 to November 15, 2014.

Shifting Sands of Time

11 Saturday Oct 2014

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Art, Literature & Culture, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Vervemagazine.in October 2014

International migration, home and displacement of time are explored in this solo show by artist Tahireh Lal in Bangalore

GALLERYSKE_TahirehLal_TheHourglass_1-300x450_c

Tahireh Lal’s material experiments with sand began while walking on the beaches of Toronto Island. Metaphysical Gravity exhibits the artist’s installation, video and kinetic sculpture. Lal explores the idea of international migration – home in the context of contemporary mobility.

The Hourglass (shown above) reflects on the nature of time. Within a rotating hourglass, sand flows from one chamber to the other. However, magnetic forces hold part of the sand in permanent suspension; thereby remarking on the conflict between clock time and lived time in one’s experience of new and unfamiliar environments.

Lal’s artwork has featured at film festivals and in galleries in India and at international events. She currently runs her art practice out of Koliabur, Assam and Bangalore.

Metaphysical Gravity previews this evening (7pm) and is on show until November 21, 2014 at Gallery SKE (2 Berlie Street, Langford Town, Bangalore).

Tall Tales

10 Friday Oct 2014

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Art, Literature & Culture, Publication: Verve Magazine

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Vervemagazine.in October 2014

Satirical collages and metaphors make for descriptive storytelling in Abul Hisham’s new works showing in Mumbai

Abul-Hisham-Royal-Portrait-2013-Acrylic-pastel-charcoal-on-paper-152.4-x-122.4-cm-60-x-48-in-

Kerala-born and Hyderabad-based artist Abul Hisham’s works have an absurdist quality in their satirical collages that make for a powerful visual spectacle. Drawing inspiration from mythology, art history, cinema, popular culture and religion, you find his works talking to you or unfolding a story in the manner of an elevated picture book, with layers of metaphorical meaning.

5 Qs with the artist, Abul Hisham:

1. Artistic motivations “It’s the passion of doing things. I am interested in transferring idea onto medium and transforming it. ‘Constructing’ different things – media, characters, even text, helps me get closer to the idea.”

2. Inspirations “Art history, the cinema, religious mythology and cartoons inspire my work. Artists who inspire me greatly are Goya and Manet.”

3. Artists at home “There are too many!”

4. Concerns that show up in your work “Religious conflicts and caste systems. The two things matter the most today.”

5. If you weren’t an artist…. “A lot of my family members were going to the Middle East and some took up civil engineering. So there was talk of that when I completed 12th grade. But I chose art school instead!”

Abul Hisham’s new works previewed on Art Night Thursday October 9, 2014 and continue until November 22, 2014 at Galerie Mirchandani + Steinruecke (2 Sunny House, 16/18 Mereweather Road, Behind Taj Mahal Hotel, Colaba, Mumbai).

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