Teesta Bhandare presents – ‘The Evolution of Now’ a pop up exhibition for young collectors. Teesta also previously established and directed Young Collectors’ Weekend, a pan India initiative to create engagement and discourse between art practitioners and collectors who are in various stages of their practice or collection journey, respectively. In the same vein, Young Collectors’ Pop Up inculcates meaningful dialogue through exhibitions, workshops, and the infusion of technology in art. By merging art with technology and creating conversation through exhibitions, workshops, masterclasses, and panel discussion, Young Collectors’ Pop Up provides a holistic avenue for art appreciation.
The exhibition takes place in Mumbai from the 11th until the 14th of January at Kathiwada City House, a center for culture, art and wellness and their cultural partner of the exhibition.
‘The Evolution of Now’ is a group exhibition of 8 artists from across India, whose practices vary in style, medium and genre.
Each artistic practice represented in the exhibition is currently still in the process of self-exploration and evolution. On the one hand the exhibition provides a sense of familiarity and resonance. Each viewer can relate on a personal or social level with the inner mechanics of the practices displayed. While, on the other hand through representations of the present word they also provide differing perspectives and alternative ways of seeing the same instance or stimuli.
In line with reflecting the reality of now, this exhibition entails a nexus between art and technology through the utilization of blockchain to establish a clear chain of provenance. The origin of each work is linked directly to the artist themselves; this proof of origin is preserved on Art Garde’s proprietary technology.
List of Participating Artists :
1. Purvai Rai
Purvai is a graphic designer, textile designer and multimedia artist. Her delicate graphite and ink drawings on rice paper are a reflection on current upheavals in society and politics, specifically discriminations on the basis of religion and cultural identity, and expressions of dissent. Distilled into an abstract visual language consisting of circles and elliptical patterns, however, they allow Purvai to allude and (re-)present without contentiousness, and to speculate and hint at the precariousness of existences on the margins.
2. Ritu Aggarwal
Ritu is a contemporary artist whose practice is associated with geometric abstraction, abstract illusionism and hard-edged painting. A resident of New Delhi, one of the most densely populated urban centers in the world, her practice has always revolved around the idea of urbanization. Through her work she questions interpretations and interactions with the spaces that surround her and uses two-dimensional picture planes and colours to express certain moods or thoughts.
“My work shows my love for architectural forms, painted, elevated, embedded and layered on a colourful grid.” – Ritu Aggarwal
3. Kaushik Saha
Growing up in Kolkata in a middle-class family in the tumultuous 90s and the first decade of the new millennium offered Kaushik a ringside view of how hollowed out slogans of social piety that promised an egalitarian society turned into the bizarre and the ridiculous in my home state of West Bengal.
Landscape has always been a major presence in Kaushik’s work. A barren, undulating, chumming landscape painted in a quasi-romantic expressionistic flourish remained the mainstay of his imagery for quite some time. The landscapes have no vegetation but are pock marked with that ubiquitous marker of a consumer society, the advertising billboards or the hoardings
4. Meera George
Meera’s practice is heavily inspired by ongoing and alarming climate change.
She says, “stoney white carcass, once bursting with colour and life, resigns to a memory that once was.My recent mixed media artworks focus on the effects of climate change on the rising temperatures of sea water and its impact on the delicate coral life and biodiversity. Coral bleaching happens when the sea water is too warm. It forces the corals to expel the algae living in their tissues causing them to turn completely white. Some corals during the process of bleaching, change color as a last-ditch effort to survive. The dying corals gain more pigment, and glow in shades of neon. Researchers believe it encourages algae to return. This phenomenon is a chilling, beautiful and heartbreaking final cry for help as the coral attempts to grab our attention. My latest series is an attempt to bring your attention to this occurrence in the depths of our oceans. The works created in mixed media. acrylic offers scope for exploration through colour, texture and illusion.”
5. Dheeraj Yadav
Dheeraj believes that lines serve as the perfect medium for expressing creative vision. It is within these lines that a world of endless possibilities opens, inspiring me to creative novels that reflect my artistic practice.”
Through his drawings and mixed medium works, Dheeraj experiments with storytelling through lines and paper in all their forms.
6. Akshata Mokshi
Akshata’s passion for painting landscapes and observational drawings around nature found expression in tapestry weaving, which she refers to as “painting by yarn”.
As a student of fine arts at the J.J. School of Arts, Mumbai, Akshata was initially introduced to weaving tapestries. Since then she has showcased her works with considerable praise in India and abroad.
7. Pavan Kavitkar
Pavan’s practice is heavily influenced by the everyday objects that he collects. Each object, and by extension each work is a representation of some memory or emotion that he associates with the object. His experiences with migration also explain his connection with objects.
“Shifting my space mental as well as physical; my oeuvre evolves with the understanding of these spaces.”- Pavan Kavitkar
8. Sheena Bajaria
Sheena’s efforts to capture spontaneous creation is much like the ongoing evolution of our world. She compares the strokes of her brushstrokes with how generations shape our journey as individuals and for humankind at large, weaving stories that unfold with surprises and revelations.
Through her abstract creations and powerful brushstrokes, the energy of each work is almost palpable by the viewer and invites the audience to get lost in the strokes and the intentional and unintentional shapes formed by them.
The exhibition will also showcase a panel discussion led by Anish Gawande Gawande in conversation with Tina Tahiliani Parikh, Sangita Kathiwada and Kamal Malik taking place on 13 January 2024, 5:30-7 pm at Kathiwada City House. By featuring diverse perspectives from esteemed panelists, “Art Beyond the Canvas” seeks to redefine the boundaries of art and inspire a broader understanding of its significance in different industries.
About the Curator: Teesta Bhandare
Teesta Bhandare, the Associate Director of Art Mumbai, the city’s first art fair which took place in November 2023 has championed a wider audience for art appreciation and more avenues of representation for contemporary artists. In 2020 she established Young Collectors’ Weekend, and subsequently has launched various endeavours with this mission in mind.She is also the founder of Art Garde. Teesta has been invited to speak at various events and write for various publications about her experience as a curator, collector and an advisor.
About Art Garde
Art Garde is a forward-facing platform that seeks to promote, protect and increase engagement with the larger art ecosystem. Founded by Teesta Bhandare in 2021, it serves a two- fold commitment to art through the promotion of cultural engagement and the preservation of provenance tracing by creating a patented tagging technology. While the art tech is set to launch in 2024, since its inception Art Garde has engaged in endeavors to promote the art industry at large. Art Garde has organised exhibitions and nation-wide art law camps to increase artist and collectors’ awareness about their legal rights. Each artwork exhibited in this show will have a corresponding digital twin which contains information regarding provenance and authenticity.
Show Details:
Date – 11th January to 14th January 2024
Venue – Kathiwada City House, Worli Mumbai.
