Five must-see exhibitions in Mumbai this season

Source Art Basel by Dilpreet Bhullar
Globally known as the financial capital of India, Mumbai places equal emphasis on the preservation of the country’s rich art history without losing sight of the contemporary. Throughout history, and up until today, the city’s flourishing creative scene has fostered a culture of diversity and belonging: Mumbai was once home to the pioneering Progressive Art Collective, whose legacy continues to be seen in the recognition of art as a form of dissent and change in an age afflicted with myopia, while events like the Kala Ghoda Festival and Mumbai Urban Art Festival act as symbols of the city’s interconnectedness. This season, galleries and institutions in Mumbai are reflecting such ethos, presenting works by a spectrum of established and emerging Indian artists who, through their experimentations in genre, format, and form, illustrate various facets of their country’s history. These five exhibitions in particular are worth noting.
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Gond Tribal Art by Jangarh Singh Shyam Sells for Record High at Pundole’s Auction

Source The Wire by John Elliott
Sales of Indian modern art are hitting new highs in the wake of the pandemic. A $16.34 million auction at Mumbai-based Pundole on February 23 produced record prices for several artists. A couple of weeks earlier, the annual India Art Fair in New Delhi that yielded substantial sales with virtually all galleries reportin substantial results for the second year running. The most surprising record at the Pundole auction was a Rs 65 lakh hammer price (just over $91,000 including buyer’s premium) for a Gond tribal canvas by Jangarh Singh Shyam, probably India’s leading Adivasi artist. Painted in 2001, a few months before he died, the 27 in x 40 in serigraphy and acrylic work depicts a traditional scene of Lord Krishna dancing with his gopi (follower), surrounded by a popular Gond rendering of brightly coloured animals, birds and trees. The artist’s previous record of $31,250 was at Sothebys in 2010.
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How The Gandhys Of Chemould Introduced Modern Art To The Masses In Mumbai

Source Homegrown by Gulbahaar Kaur
The Gandhy family at large brought forth a new art culture and appreciation that was not bound by artistic snobbery. Instead they found a way to communicate to the ordinary Indian and transformed Mumbai into a cultural spectacle like Delhi and Kolkata. Kekoo Gandhy and his business partner and wife Khorshed Gandhy introduced stories as well as visuals that spoke of secularism and libertarian ideas during a highly polarising period in Indian politics. The two artistic narratives take a deep dive into this history, providing context to the efforts of the Gandhy family in furthering the communist movement in India. The role they played in shaping a post-ayodhya Mumbai and how they were able to form a historic institution. The book had a formal unveiling at the India Art Fair and is now available at bookstores. The film, made by Gandhy’s daughter Behroze, is set to premiere in Paris & British Film Institute this February.
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The Museum of Art and Photography offers a digital-friendly, interactive experience

Source GQ by Sanjana Ray
Sawhney’s statement is accompanied by a giant sweep of a digital screen sporting six categories: Living Traditions, Modern & Contemporary Art, Photography, Popular Culture, Pre-Modern Art and Textiles, Craft & Design. Click on any of these and it opens up a litany of the museum’s replete collection of the artworks under the particular category. Each artwork then opens further to proffer up all its nitty-gritty details with the notion of providing history at your fingertips: a great way to sift through the 60,000 odd artworks on display across the museum. But even as visitors are tempted to dive into a pit of nostalgia (the museum even has on display some of Bollywood’s most classic film posters), the aim remains to give art history a modern edge. Abhishek Poddar, founder and driving force behind the museum says: “My hope for Museum of Art and Photography is that it can reach people, especially the next generation, in whose hands our future is held. More than half of our population are under 25 years old; no country has more young people. I believe they are the ones, the generation of change, who will eventually be the real curators of MAP.”
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Drawing from life: The Vayeda brothers are taking Warli in a new direction

Source The Hindustan Times by Shireen Quadri
Sprawled across a canvas 132 ft by 40 ft were shapes that could have been leaves, plants, flowers, birds flying in a limitless blue expanse. The entrance to the recently concluded India Art Fair (February 9 to 12) was a breathtaking Warli mural that became a crowd-puller, a crowd-stopper, a hashtag on Instagram. The work was created by Tushar Vayeda, 35, and Mayur Vayeda, 30, also known as the Vayeda Brothers, as a contemporary take on the Warli folk painting tradition from Maharashtra. Titled Forests of the Future, it marked the brothers’ first digital art work, made by remastering high-resolution images with a software program. The response has been “very overwhelming, like a dream come true,” says Tushar Vayeda. “Our timelines are filled with Instagram tags and stories.”
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Collector Abhishek Poddar’s New Museum in India’s ‘Silicon Valley’ Takes a Digital Approach to Traditional Exhibitions

Source Artnet by Cleo Roberts-Komireddi
India’s newest and perhaps most ambitious institution, the Museum of Art and Photography (MAP), is set to open in Bengaluru (Bangalore) on February 18 after much anticipation and a few delays. Known as India’s Silicon Valley, the city is home to many artists, yet it has been on the fringes of the country’s art and cultural offerings, which tend to cluster in New Delhi and Mumbai. Founded by businessman Abhishek Poddar, and dedicated to widening accessibility to South Asian art, MAP has been a stop-start journey from concept to actualization, largely due to construction delays. The task of developing a world-leading museum in an area with scant government support for culture, in addition to a relatively desolate museum landscape in relation to the region’s rich artistic heritage, was always going to be tricky. “I had one person who told me when I was embarking on this project, ‘Abhishek, you are making the biggest mistake of your life,’” said Poddar in a telephone interview.
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India Art Fair was all about artistic experience and creative inspiration

Source Telegraph India by Louise Nicholson
Another two artists whose dreams were realised at the fair are brothers from northern Maharashtra’s Warli tribal community. Mayur and Tushar Vayeda, aged 30 and 34, were represented by Ojas Art. They were also one of the fair’s four artists in residence. Modest, and with no formal art training, they were surprised that their rising fame drew a full house for their talk and a packed workshop to learn the symbolism of Warli paintings. Mayur and Tushar always paint together on a canvas and whoever starts an area, such as a river or hillside of trees, will complete it. They reason that each has a slightly different style, though few other people might see this. In their community, they have a deep commitment to encouraging Warli women to keep making traditional wedding ‘chowk’ wall-paintings, and recording all the painting symbolism. “We always go back to the village to listen to the people,” they said. “Our painting is a language that tells stories. We grew up playing with nature in the Sahyadri hills. We have local knowledge, we talk to the shermans, elders, women.” With this knowledge, the brothers give new meaning to an old subject in their big ‘Tree of Life’ painting at the Ojas Art booth: their tree has two trunks, interlaced root systems, and one feathery mass of assorted leaves. “We imagined a forest where all the trees are one, connected, as they really are,” they explained.
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The Mumbai Urban Art Festival shows the city’s evolving relationship with the sea

Source Artchitectural Digest by Shubhanjana Das
The city of dreams. The maximum city. The financial capital of India. Home to Bollywood. There are as many names for Mumbai as there are avatars of it. But if there’s one thing that is constant for the city, it is the water that embraces it while simultaneously threatening to engulf it. And it is this relationship of the city with the sea that inspires this year’s Mumbai Art Festival by St+Art India supported by Asian Paints. The three-month-long festival that ends 23 February 2023 aims to make art accessible to diverse audiences by stripping off the formality of conventional art spaces.
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What to watch out for at the India Art Fair 2023

Source Architectural India by Avantika Shankar
At Gallery Maskara’s IAF booth, four artists will showcase work across a range of mediums, highlighting how traditional materials can be employed in experimental, contemporary forms. Parag Sonarghare’s larger-than-life, hyper-realistic portraits depict the haunting emotionality of his subjects, who are often from marginalized communities; Prashant Pandey’s abstract sculptures, by contrast, are ephemeral contemplations on human activity; Priyanka Choudhary’s natural pigment text-based works consider the state of the human condition and finally, T. Venkanna’s virulent and unconventional imagery provokes an entirely new perspective on human life. The gallery will also showcase objects of furniture that were born out of a collaboration between T. Venkanna and architect Rooshad Shroff.
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India Art Fair Returns with a Focus on Young Collectors and South Asian Artists

Source Artsy by Reena Devi
“The [Indian] art scene has seen a transformative shift, and together with our artists, galleries, and partners, we’re proud to pave the way for a bold and inclusive new era in the art world,” said Asokan, the fair’s director. “We are determined to deliver the largest and most ambitious edition yet, featuring a diverse range of new and emerging artists from all corners of India and South Asia. “The fair strategy has shifted towards a more domestic focus, driven by strong demand within India and a growing collecting base in cities beyond Delhi and Mumbai who are willing to buy across mediums and price points,” said fair director Jaya Asokan. According to the fair organizers, this approach was a response to the rising number of collectors across India, akin to other parts of Asia such as Japan and South Korea.
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Intricate Warli mural by Vayeda brothers on the India Art Fair façade mesmerises art lovers

Source The Indian Express by Shreya Agrawal
India Art Fair 2023 commenced on Thursday with 86 exhibitors, including 72 galleries and 12 institutions. As you enter the NSIC Exhibition Grounds in Okhla, you’ll be met with not just a crowd of eager art lovers but also a breathtaking façade featuring an intricate Warli mural by Vayeda brothers, Mayur and Tushar. Titled ‘Forests of the Future’, it is the artists’ first digital take on the traditional art of Warli painting, which they have been practising for almost 12 years now. The artist duo highlighted that tribal art, in India, is “underrated” in many ways. “People still look at Warli as a decorative art. So, we really want to find the right place and platform where we can celebrate our centuries-old heritage,” Mayur added. Expressing his happiness over the façade featuring their artwork, Mayur said, “I am elated. I came in the morning and was very excited to see the façade come to life along with the various panels. It’s the best feeling to be the face of the India Art Fair this year. Last year, we were here and discussed about the day we would exhibit here. Today, we are on the façade.”
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Waswo X. Waswo’s solo exhibition at the India Art Fair transcends art and time itself

Source Artchitectural Digest by Arman Khan
The artist, writer and photographer who was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in the USA, has lived and exhibited in India for over 20 years, largely working out of his studio in Udaipur, Rajasthan, often collaborating with local artists to carve out a visual language that is best described as amorphous. Now, Waswo's new and previously unseen miniature paintings will be presented by Gallery Espace at a solo booth in the Focus section of the India Art Fair in Delhi, as part of a solo exhibition titled “Last Ride in The Wild, Wild East”. The miniature works at the display, for the first time, incorporate elements of realism, including details from masterpieces by M.F. Husain, Tyeb Mehta and Bhupen Khakhar.
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Everything You Need To Keep An Eye Out For At India Art Fair 2023

Source Grazia by Nida Naeem
It’s a great time to be a part of the Indian art scene. Exhibitions, art walks, public art projects, pop-up events and more have made art accessible like never before. Artists are amassing new fans through the support of contemporary platforms pushing the cultural dialogue in a global direction. More and more artists, curators, and collectors now belong to broader intersections of identity, expanding on the vision of a more inclusive arts culture. And where better to immerse yourself in this culture than at India Art Fair?
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India Lowdown: Must-See Exhibitions in New Delhi

Source Ocula by Cleo Roberts-Komireddi
As India Art Fair (9–12 February 2023) launches its largest edition with over 85 participating galleries and an expanded site incorporating a digital art space, New Delhi's galleries are fired up. From Indigenous art forms to new concepts of pop, Ocula Magazine shares exhibition highlights across the city.
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India Art Fair 2023: How to navigate the event like a seasoned old-timer

Source Vogue India by Riddhi Dastitar
India Art Fair is back in Delhi from 9th to 12th February for its 13th edition. As the doldrums and general inactivity of January recede, one of the most beautiful months in the city arrives. The winning combination of sun and temperance makes it the perfect season for weekend walks around the India Art Fair’s massive grounds at NSIC, Okhla as well as to drop in on the slew of parallel events at the city’s many art hubs. Whether you’re a creative, connoisseur, curator, collector, or just curious, India Art Fair is the place to get a pulse of the country’s contemporary art scene, encounter a modern master or stumble into your new favourite artist(s). Here’s Vogue India’s guide on what to look out for.
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In memoriam: Balkrishna V Doshi (1927 – 2023)

Source Wall Paper by Ellie Stathaki
A glance at the dates and it's clear that Balkrishna V Doshi and modern Indian architecture grew side by side. A student at the JJ School of Art in Mumbai when India celebrated its independence in 1947, the architect's career runs alongside the creation of some of the country's most iconic contemporary architecture. From his involvement in the Chandigarh project and India's famous Le Corbusier and Louis Kahn heritage, through to its finest architecture education institution – he designed and founded the School of Architecture and Planning in Ahmedabad in 1962 – Dr Balkrishna Vithaldas Doshi has been an omnipresent figure for a remarkable period of India's built environment.
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Institution-Building in the Global South: Roobina Karode of the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art in New Delhi

Source Art in America by Mira Dayal
When the Kiran Nadar Museum opened in 2010, we had a three-pronged approach: build a collection, build a museum, and build an audience. We didn’t have a real museum space yet, but we still had to create the museum, so we worked hard on forming an audience base and expanding the collection. At that time, there were just over 200 works in the collection; we’ve now crossed the 10,000 mark. That includes photographs, drawings, prints, and installations dating from the 1950s onward. Not having a specifically designed building had its positive side, because we were not confined to the museum; we organized exhibitions in Chandigarh, Jaipur, Kerala. I often draw concentric circles: We are located here, but we have to move from the museum to the city, from this city to another city, then to the nation and outside the country. But finally, we were able to find land for a building that Adjaye Associates is now designing. It will be an art and culture center with eight galleries as well as auditoriums, ideation rooms, a library, and a restaurant. We will be able to bring out a lot of the collection, rotated annually.
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Mumbai's commercial art scene undergoes major 'post-pandemic' expansion

Source The Art News Paper by Kabir Jhala
In what is being presented as a sure sign of India's flourishing art market, Mumbai Gallery Weekend (MGW) is currently holding its largest edition yet (until 15 January), with 32 participants—its first regular event since 2020. Since then, the financial capital's gallery landscape has seen significant shifts as India's leading dealers have rolled out expansion and relocation plans in the city. The first such instance was in March 2022, when Mumbai's oldest contemporary art gallery Chemould Prescott Road launched an extension programme supporting young and emerging artists. Chemould CoLab, named in part for its location in the southern gallery hub neighbourhood of Colaba, is co-directed by Sunaina Rajan and Atyaan Jungalwala, the daughter of Chemould Prescott Road's owner Shireen Gandhy.
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8 must-see shows at the ongoing Mumbai Gallery Weekend 2023

Source Archirectural Digest by Shaikh Ayaz
Whatever your thoughts on Maximum City's cultural life, the Mumbai Gallery Weekend 2023 (MGW) is here to enliven it. More than 30 leading galleries have banded together this year for exhibitions and special events including pop-up shows and dance performances sprawled across different sites around the city (though still in close proximity to each other). This ongoing four-day extravaganza (on until 15 January) offers a tantalizing window into Mumbai's art scene where creative conversation, above all else, connects enthusiasts, students, artists, collectors and gallerists with members of the public. Art is for everyone and MGW, currently in its 11th year, embodies that utilitarian philosophy, giving visitors a platform to engage in a thoughtful dialogue with history, politics, culture, craftsmanship and global trends in visual arts. As Mortimer Chatterjee, director, Chatterjee & Lal gallery, puts it: "This is a time when all the galleries come together as a community and celebrate modern and contemporary art. It's like a festival."
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Here's what to expect from the India Art Fair 2023

Source Artchitectural Digest by Gautami Reddy
As we continue to stay true to our mission of bringing the best of modern and cutting-edge contemporary art from India and South Asia, all in one place, in this edition we pool together our collective learnings from the last few years. Making space for traditional art forms of South Asia, the fair facade will be transformed into a “Forest of the Future” by a talented Warli artist duo, the Vayeda Brothers, who bring a contemporary outlook to the ancient art form from Maharashtra. Our other Artists in Residence — Debashish Paul and Lakshmi Madhavan — will present exciting projects. While Paul will unfold his queer identity in a performance art piece, Madhavan’s community-driven art practice will shine through in her installation of bright white-and-gold kasavu textiles made in collaboration with the fast-disappearing community of weavers of Balarampuram in Kerala. I am particularly excited about some of our art projects. My favourites include Parag Tandel’s thought-provoking sculptural installation in which he recreates the seven small islands that made up Mumbai before it grew into a mega metropolis; a surreal eight-foot-tall, twisted fibreglass scale by Shivani Agarwal inviting audiences to measure the intangible, such as emotions of love, joy, intimacy, and truth; and a monumental sculpture resembling a pelvic bone by Prashant Pandey, which references the marvellous moment of the birth of life — all of which will be spread across the warm winter outdoors of the fair.
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Meet the Vayeda Brothers—artists and storytellers taking the beauty of Warli to the world

Source Architectural Digest by Gautami Reddy
"Warli is not just an art form; we are a people,” assert the young artist and sibling duo Mayur and Tushar Vayeda who are here to prove a point. Hailing from the village of Ganjad in rural Maharashtra, the duo—better known as the Vayeda Brothers—have been passionately chronicling their memories and observations of community life in their art. “We want to act as a bridge between the ancient and modern worlds by translating the wisdom and knowledge passed down from our ancestors into a language that can be understood by all,” explain the duo who see themselves as not just artists but also researchers, storykeepers, and educators. Today, the Vayeda Brothers firmly believe: “Warli is our responsibility.” They are infusing a new dynamism by showcasing at international exhibitions and residencies, creating ambitious illustrated book projects and marking their presence in monumental murals all over the world—including a larger-thanlife seascape that was unveiled at Sassoon Docks for the Mumbai Urban Arts Festival in December 2022 and the facade of India Art Fair in New Delhi, which will be transformed into a “Forest of the Future” in February 2023. With all this and more, the Vayeda Brothers are rising to the occasion by breaking the boundaries between folk and contemporary art.
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Meet the greatest modernists of the Indian folk art

Source Architectural Design by Gautami Reddy
There is no one story of Indian folk art. Be it the canvas-filling geometric shapes of ancient Warli art from Maharashtra, the dizzying dashes and dots of Gond and Bhil art from central India, or the playful yet precise paintings of Madhubani and Kalighat art from the east, each form has its own deep history and vocabulary, despite the many interactions and interconnections. In the last century, industrial paper has replaced mud walls and floors as the main canvas, and the sacred philosophies behind many of the folk traditions have become absorbed into the grand narrative of the country’s race to modernize. Many of the self-taught artists, outsiders to urban art markets, have been compelled to take to daily-wage labour. However, a few have stood the test of time — sometimes by chance and sometimes through sheer will—radically opposing reigning ideas of industrial progress and art market trends, and inspiring younger generations of artists today. Here, we celebrate the greatest modernists of Indian folk art.
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What I Buy and Why: Collector Kiran Nadar on Championing Indian Artists on the Global Stage

Source Artnet News by Eileen Kinsella
Kiran Nadar has become a central force in India’s cultural landscape. In 2010, she founded the private nonprofit Kiran Nadar Museum of Art to house her collection of more than 8,000 works of Modern and contemporary Indian art. With branches in both Delhi and Noida, Nadar sees the museum as a way to ensure wide accessibility to the collection and foster a museum-going culture among younger Indians. Beyond India, Nadar has forged collaborations on a global scale with the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Tate Modern, Centre Pompidou, Musee Guimet, the India Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, the Reina Sofia, and the Sharjah Foundation. She has supported Indian artists including Jayshree Chakravarty, Nasreen Mohamedi, Nalini Malani, and Bhupen Kkakhar. When she’s not promoting the arts at home and abroad, Nadar also happens to be an internationally renowned bridge player. We caught up with Nadar at her home in Delhi, where she lives with her husband, Shiv Nadar.
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India at 75 | Timeline: Art

Source Frontline The Hindu by Anupama Katakam

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Bangalore’s Newest Museum, Home to a 60,000-Object Collection of South Asian Visual Culture, Will Open in December

Source Artnews by Vittoria Benzine
Abhishek Poddar donated foundational works for MAP’s collection, which now tops 60,000 works following further contributions from the Deepak Puri Collection, the private collection of Rahul Sabhnani, and original commissions. Altogether, the collection bridge historical periods and creative approaches from painting and sculpture to textiles, tribal art, and memorabilia from India’s globally renowned Bollywood Industry. The variety “deliberately blurs the boundaries between what is regarded as high art and the everyday creativity of the region’s communities,” the museum said. “The photography collection is one of the most extensive in India with a particular focus on the period from the mid-19th century, a turning point in the history of Britain’s colonial relationship with the region, right up to the present day,” the museum added.
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