Vivan Sundaram Indian, b. 1943
Biography
Born in 1943 in Shimla, Vivan Sundaram studied painting at M.S. University, Baroda, and the Slade School of Fine Art, London. With a diverse practice across sculpture, painting, installation, photography and video, he has had solo shows around the world, including New York, Chicago, London, Paris, Toronto, Montreal and Copenhagen.
The Tate Modern opened an exhibit titled Memorial 1993–2014, featuring a room-sized installation of Sundaram’s work in 2023. His last solo exhibition, GAGAWAKA + Post-Mortem (2015), engaged the audience in a compelling dialogue around material, fashion, ecology, body image and the idea of aging. He has exhibited his work at important international venues, including the Sharjah Biennale (2023, 2005); Kochi Biennale (2023, 2012); Sydney (2008); Seville (2006); Taipei (2006); and Shanghai (2004), among others, and has several museum participations, including the Tate Modern, London; the International Centre for Photography, New York; Queens Museum, New York; the Mori Art Museum, Tokyo; Haus der Kunst, Munich; Museum of Modern Art Ludwig Foundation, Vienna; Chicago Cultural Centre, Chicago; the Museum of Modern Art, Copenhagen; and Haus der Kulteren Welt, Berlin, to name a few.
In 2010, the book Amrita Sher-Gil: A Self-portrait in Letters and Writings, edited and annotated by Vivan Sundaram, was published by Tulika Books, Delhi.
The artist passed away in 2023 in New Delhi.
Works
Exhibitions
Art Fairs
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Frieze London 2024
And The Strokes Come Like Speech 9 - 13 October 2024Our curation titled And the Strokes Come Like Speech presents the artwork as an archaeological site, as similarly load-bearing to an edifice – a material...Read more -
INDIA ART FAIR 2023
NSIC Exhibition Grounds, Okhla, New Delhi 9 - 12 February 2023With a diverse roster of artists across conditioning, intention, practice and cultural attitudes – including A. Ramachandran, Anju Dodiya, Atul Dodiya, Balkrishna Doshi, Biraaj Dodiya,...Read more
Bulletin
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Lahore Biennale 02
ArtForum 1 May 2020For an Indian, like me, the biennial was a place of ambiguity, of familiarity mixed with otherness. In Vivan Sundaram’s black-and-white photomontages “Re-take of Amrita,”...Read more -
INTERVIEW WITH VIVAN SUNDARAM
By Kamayani Sharma | The White Review 1 May 2019When I meet Vivan Sundaram at his residence in Delhi, he pulls out the catalogue of his 2018 survey exhibition DISJUNCTURES at Haus der Kunst,...Read more -
Vivan Sundaram and his photographic eye
By Benita Fernando | Mint 30 March 2019There are numerous ways to describe Vivan Sundaram—conceptual artist, installer, archivist and sculptor—but surely, “photographer' is not one of them. Among India’s more notable contemporary...Read more -
History is refracted in the ongoing Vivan Sundaram retrospective
By Gayatri Sinha | The Hindu 2 June 2018Viewing an exhibition brings about its own kind of experience. ‘Step Inside And You Are No Longer A Stranger’, the first retrospective of the works...Read more -
Vivan Sundaram: My Experiments with Art
By Bhumika Popli | Sunday Guardian 14 April 2018It is difficult to understand an artist’s mind. Only his work could provide you with certain linkages to his psyche, and in some cases even...Read more -
Vivan Sundaram: Between Matter and Memory
By Rosalyn D'Mello | Open Magazine 11 April 2018MINIATURE terracotta figurines idle by the wayside. I am tempted, but do not dare touch them. As I await Vivan Sundaram’s arrival, his artist-assistants, Arun...Read more -
Vivan Sundaram: Indian art 'needed a new vocabulary'
By Somak Ghoshal | CNN 19 February 2018The title of artist Vivan Sundaram's retrospective at the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art (KNMA) in New Delhi welcomes the viewer in with a promise:...Read more -
Retrospective | 'Vivan Sundaram: FIFTY YEARS STEP INSIDE AND YOU ARE NO LONGER A STRANGER' at Kiran Nadar Museum of Art
Kiran Nadar Museum of Art 9 February 2018KNMA is presenting this year, the first ever retrospective of eminent artist Vivan Sundaram, one of the most influential artists of his generation in India....Read more -
‘I am always responding to crisis’: Artist Vivan Sundaram on 50 years of his work
By Vandana Kalra | The Indian Express 29 January 2018Vivan Sundaram, one of India’s pioneering video and installation artists, brings together 50 years of his work in “Step inside and you are no longer...Read more -
Vivan Sundaram: A man of all mediums
By Avantika Bhuyan | Mint 26 January 2018It was 1966 and London was in the throes of a cultural renaissance. It was the era of Mick Jagger and The Beatles. And also...Read more -
A CONVERSATION WITH VIVAN SUNDARAM ON AMRITA SHER-GIL’S BIOGRAPHY
Verve Magazine 20 July 2017The early 20th century produced luminaries like Amrita Sher-Gil who, with her audacious paintings of women and rural Indian life, became one of the pioneering...Read more -
On the Record
By Pallavi Chattopadhyay | The Indian Express 6 March 2017A mammoth ship-shaped structure, decorated in hues of red, yellow and blue, awaited visitors at the studio of renowned contemporary artist Vivan Sundaram. Tucked in...Read more -
Art in Review; Vivan Sundaram
By Holland Cotter | The New York Times 30 June 2006Re-Take of Amrita Sepia International 148 West 24th Street, 11th floor, Chelsea Through July 28 This haunted show by Vivan Sundaram, one of India's most...Read more -
Amrita, family in a house of dreams
By Soumitra Das | The Telegraph 13 March 2003There comes a moment in the life of every human being when the forward march of time seems to come to a stop. The present...Read more