CLOUD BURST
Group Show
8 –15 April 2021
Bikaner House, New Delhi
Vadehra Art Gallery is pleased to announce our participation in this year’s Delhi Contemporary Art Week at Bikaner House, where we will be presenting an energetic curation that’s fresh, playful and poignant, by an exciting list of emerging and younger contemporary artists, including Shrimanti Saha, Vicky Roy, Shailesh B.R., Sujith S.N., Pranati Panda Treibor Mawlong and Anandajit Ray.
Our curation titled Cloud Burst features a diverse set of expressions around the general human condition and undertakings, articulated either through more intimate mental and bodily experiences as with Pranati Panda and Treibor Mawlong; an encyclopaedic cataloguing of intellectual and observed references as seen with Shrimanti Saha, Vicky Roy and Shailesh B.R.; or an extrapolated concentration on the particularities of how we occupy space as seen in work by Sujith S.N.
Pranati Panda’s The Soft Land assigns a visceral and physiological weight to the experience of time, which she examines in layers of striking detail that emerge as personal philosophy, the precision of needle and thread acting almost as an imprint of handwriting.
Titled Animal Kingdom, Vicky Roy’s collection of black-and-white photographs is a foray into the constructed habitats of animals and the evocative illusions of nature, while travelling through both private and public properties in India.
In Somewhere, Elsewhere, Here, Treibor Mawlong’s wood-cuts feature expressionistic plots constructed through observational nuance as he considers human narratives of passion, honor, love, pride, grief, loss and change through a visual language that borrows from comic books, rich with persuasive textuality.
Through her dystopian landscapes that tread the fine line between myth and reality, in Confabulations Shrimanti Saha importantly visits contemporary dialogues, constructing macro-narratives through a coding and accommodation of various micro-references, ranging from personal experiences of memory and conversation to a plethora of external sources and disciplines.
Shailesh B.R.’s visual language has an aura of iconography and in विपर्यासः। Displacement, he questions the fundamental meaning of the objects and rituals that surround us, seeking to ground such an understanding in absolute knowledge while doubting absolute meaning altogether since intellectual interventions are inherently acts of displacement.
Prelude, a series of landscape and portrait paintings by Sujith S.N., appears to follow the trajectory of the everyday – featuring everyday people in everyday places doing everyday things, however a deeper reading reveals signifying narratives of the inter-relationships between these protagonists and the spaces they do or do not occupy.
Anandajit Ray’s Myasmatica consume the generality of the surrounding environment with open-minded largesse, while invoking a humorous approach to what can be noted as intense perceptions. He is interested in pictorializing the intersection between the illusions of thought and the reality of vision, by pledging hyper-awareness to the boundaries between external happenings and internal imprinting.
In addition to our main presentation, we will also be featuring a bronze sculpture by Gigi Scaria, works on paper by Jagannath Panda and drawings by Susanta Mandal, as part of Residues, curated by Reha Sodhi.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Born in 1987 in Meghalaya, TREIBOR MAWLONG completed a bachelor’s and master’s in fine arts in painting from Kala Bhavan, Visva Bharati University, Santiniketan. He has participated in several solo and group exhibitions, including the Fumetto Festival, Lucerne (2019); Akar Prakar, New Delhi (2019); Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi (2018, 2016); the Indian Museum, Seoul (2016); Meghalaya Art Fest, Shillong (2014–2016); Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi (2014), among several others. He is the recipient of several awards, including the Inlaks Fine Arts Award, Mumbai, 2014; the Talented Young Artist Award, Dimapur, 2014; the Lalit Kala Akademi Scholarship Grant, New Delhi, 2012–13; and the Kala Sakshi Memorial Trust Award, New Delhi, 2011. He has also completed art residencies at the Harmony Art Foundation, Mumbai, in 2015 and at What About Art, Mumbai, supported by the Inlaks India Foundation, in 2014. The artist lives and works in Mawbri, Meghalaya.
Born in 1987 in West Bengal, SHRIMANTI SAHA completed a BVA in painting at the Faculty of Fine Arts, 2009, and an MVA in painting at the Faculty of Fine Arts, MS University, Baroda, 2011. In 2018–19, she received the Amol Vadehra Art Grant by the Foundation of Indian Contemporary Art. She also received the Inlaks Fine Arts Award in 2015 and was a runner-up for the Glenfiddich Emerging Artist Award in 2014. She received the Krishnakriti Scholarship, Hyderabad, in 2008–11, and has participated in residencies such as the Taj Residency and Ske Project, Bangalore, 2015 and Kalakriti Artist-in-Residence, Hyderabad, 2015. She has been part of group shows at Nature Morte, Gurgaon; Gallerie 88, Kolkata; Barter Collection, Mumbai Art Room, Mumbai, to name a few. The artist lives and works in Baroda.
Originally from West Bengal, VICKY ROY ran away from his home and started working as a rag-picker at the New Delhi Railway Station, before he was rehabilitated by NGO Salaam Baalak Trust, New Delhi. Roy went on to study photography at Triveni Kala Sangam and then apprenticed under Indian family photographer Anay Mann. In 2007, he held his first solo exhibition titled Street Dream at the India Habitat Centre, New Delhi, supported by the British High Commission. His solo show, This Scarred Land: New Mountainscapes was exhibited at Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi, in 2017. He also participated in the Houston FotoFest Biennnial and Kochi–Muziris Biennale in 2018. Roy was awarded the MIT Media Fellowship in 2014 and listed in Forbes Asia ‘30 under 30’ in 2016. The artist lives and works in New Delhi.
Born in 1986, SHAILESH B.R. received a bachelor’s degree in fine arts, specialising in painting, from the Chamarajendran Academy of Visual Arts, Mysore, and has a post-graduate diploma from the Faculty of Fine Arts, MSU, Baroda. Shailesh’s most recent solo exhibition The Last Brahmin was held at the prestigious Villa Arson in Nice, France in 2020. Shailesh has participated in various group shows, including the CIMA Art Award Show, Kolkata; Gallery Espace, Delhi; Student’s Biennale, Kochi; Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi. He has been part of the Khoj Peers 2015 as an artist-in-residence and was invited for the Khoj Peers Share in October 2013. In 2014, Shailesh has received the Inlaks Fine Arts Award and was also invited to Sandarbh Art Residency, Partapur, as an artist-in-residence. In 2016, he was awarded the FICA Emerging Artist Award and travelled to Switzerland for a residency. In March 2017, he was invited for the Khoj residency in Goa. The artist lives and works in Vadodara, Gujarat.
Born in 1979 in Baroda, Gujarat, India, SUJITH S.N. completed an MFA from the Sarojini Naidu School of Fine Arts, Performing Arts and Communication, University of Hyderabad in 2007, and a BFA from the College of Fine Arts, Thrissur, University of Calicut in 2005. He also has a diploma as a civil draughtsman. His solo shows include Sakshi Gallery, Mumbai; Latitude 28, New Delhi; HSLU, Lucerne, Switzerland; Forum Art Gallery, Chennai; Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi. He has also participated in shows at Art Basel Hong Kong and India Art Fair, among others. He has won several awards including the Kerala Lalit Kala Academy special mention award in 2004, the Kerala Lalit Kala Academy state award in 2005 and the Foundation of Indian Contemporary Art emerging artist award in 2011. He was also long-listed for the Skoda Prize in 2011. The artist lives and works in Mumbai.
Born in 1974, PRANATI PANDA did her BFA at the BK College of Art and Crafts, Bhubaneswar, and her MFA at the Delhi College of Art. Pranati was awarded the Orissa State Akademi Award, 1993. She has participated in several group shows at Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi (2018 and 2012); Ragini Art Gallery, New Delhi (2018); Religare Art, New Delhi (2012); Project 88, Mumbai (2007); Gallery Art Resource Trust, Mumbai (2007); and Grosvenor Vadehra, London (2007), to name a few. The artist lives and works in New Delhi.
Born in 1965 in Kolkata, ANANDAJIT RAY completed his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Faculty of Fine Arts, M.S. University, Baroda. Ray has participated in several solo and group shows, more recently including Gallery Espace, New Delhi (2007); Aicon Gallery, New York ( 2009); Grosvenor Vadehra, London (2010); Pundole Art Gallery, Mumbai (2017 and 2011); Art Chennai, Chennai (2012); Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi (2014); Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai (2014); and Gallery White, Baroda (2018). He received the Elizabeth Greenshilds scholarship in 1991. The artist lives and works in Baroda, India.
