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| www.nippongallery.com |
Wednesday, 17 February 2021
Tuesday, 9 February 2021
Tuesday, 19 January 2021
PIN POSTER: NIPPON GALLERY
The Kolkata new - next Breed
16 Artist, more than 70 Artworks, explores new ways of artworks.
We assure you a phenomenal experience of the new media …
Nippon Gallery
Presents
The Kolkata New- Next Breed
Curated by
Moumita Sarkar
Sale Starts Live : 11am
20 to 27 Jan 2021
On - Screen display show - www.nippongallery.com
Saturday, 9 January 2021
A city built on artistic practice, a tradition of poetry and philosophy is today, more than ever, demanding that its inhabitants address the existing reality
Shahper born in 1984 is Syed Sarvat Ali Jafri’s first given name. It means “the feather in the shah’s crown” a name that descends from his ancestral tradition and a lineage linking directly to the once glamourous Awadh Empire of the 17th Century. His city, Faizabad - meaning the “City of Gardens” in Persian – carries the scares of the lost glory where the magnificent gates stand crumbling among collapsing palaces, temples, mosques, boisterous souks and bazaars that continue to thrive alongside the disintegrating Persian style architectural wonders that once made the city a pearl of the east.
Waqt- e- namaz Size : 21×25 in Media : Sculpture = Clay, Cement, Wood Year : 2019
Faizabad despite its lost glory
remains the inspiration for Syed Ali Jafri’s multifaceted artistic practice. He
is one of a few contemporary artists residing in the city which is now home to
100 million people, many of whom are descendants of refugees from Punjab, Sind
and others far off lands that came to settle in the flourishing city over the
centuries.
The dramatic turning point for
Faizabad came on December 6th, 1992 when Hindu Nationalists destroyed the Babri
Mosque in Ayodhya - Faizabad, next door to the Artists’ centuries old family
home. Syed Ali witnessed the riots and the ensuing bloodbath firsthand and has
since lived through the subsequent rift and polarization this event caused
within his community. The riots - and the politics that flared them - split the
society like a surgical intervention
separating the syncretic culture of Hindus and Muslims and turned neighbours
into irreconcilable enemies, destined to live in proximity.
The political realities of caste,
creed and unemployment are powerful forces of destruction chipping away at the
few remnants of a common glorious past and is rewriting the city’s
history. The pain of Faizabad - visible on the city’s decaying walls - is
one Syed Ali shares with the abandoned structures of his town that mirror
history. A city built on artistic practice, a tradition of poetry and
philosophy is today, more than ever,
demanding that its inhabitants address the existing reality. The political party of India triumph in May 2019 declared the Hindu Nationalist project a priority and thus
once more reinvigorated religious hostilities that threaten to definitively
erase spaces that maintain a collective future.
Syed Sarvat Ali Jafri believes
that the only power at his disposal to confront the emerging political reality
is Art. His personal space is a form of dissent that is optimistic and inlaid
with aesthetics demanding to engage in peaceful communal conversation. Soliciting dialogue through visual scapes -
which is essential to the Ganga- Jamuni tradition of Avadh - aims to mellow the
schism of politics and community. He is adamant that the preservation of
what is left of his culture is urgently needed and he has thus devised multiple
innovative techniques, formats and conceptual principles to deal with local
complexities.
EXHIBITION : Garden Of Remembrance
“Our minds view the world through the prisms of philosophies we believe
in, mine is the wisdom of contesting conflict and bowing out of conflicts that
define humanity today.” Syed Sarvat
Ali Jafri
Syed Sarvat Ali Jafri draws on the
contemporaneity of the syncretic Islamic visual culture that he inherited
through his lineage that imbibed the visual elements of Hinduism and Sufism. He
comes from a tradition of Shia poets who used poetry as a form of a narrative
retelling of history and pain.
In this show he explores multiple
artistic formats that together constitute the different aspects of the
narrative of peaceful struggle against marginalization. His works conceptually
replaces the loss of 17 century architecture in his city to urban chaos,
politics and time. Accordingly, the Artist integrates architecture into his
creative vocabulary through the vantage point of his familiarity with the ruins
of Shia tombs, mosques, bazaars and city-gates that dot Faizabad.
'Sajdagah' or Turbah
Series of 18 Clay Tablets
Sculptures
For local Shi’ite families
scattered around the globe, the clay tablets known as 'Sajdagah'
or “turbah” - meaning soil in Arabic – represent soil from Iraq's
Shi'ite Muslim Karbala shrine. They are a blessing, an object of remembrance,
even a cure for sickness. The Karbala tablets or 'Sajdagah' are used during
prayers by Shia Muslims worldwide. They
embody the tradition of making shrines to Imam Ali and his family during the
month of Mohurrum and incorporate symbols such as the Panjatan, Taziya and
Taboot. Elements such as a water carrier, Hazrat Abbas's hand etc..
The tablets provide certain metaphors
of longing and restitution.
Syed Sarvat Ali Jafri innovated a
technique whereby he crushes the clay used to envelope cement tiles and wood as
a form of mortar to construct miniature shrines in ode to the lost architecture
and culture of Faizabad.
18Sculpture Clay works
3 Metal wheels
15 water colour Urdu Calligraphy
Through Urdu alphabet, names and
memories as well as Persian words that form a part of our local creole Syed Ali
Jafri constructs poetic narratives of resistance drawing from a tradition of
Persian and Urdu poetry which was once common in Faizabad.
Calligraphy writing being and
ancient form of art allows the artist to reanimate through a conceptual
practice the tenets of Islamic Visual Culture. Incorporating multiple aspects
of his ancestral traditions is a form of pacifist dissent against the growing
communalism that is rapidly overtaking Faizabad’s daily environment.
By
Jihan El - Tahri
Nippon
Gallery Presents
Solo
Show
Garden
of Remembrance
Recent
works
Syed
Ali Sarvat Jafri
Curated
by
Jihan
El – Tahri
Explore
Sculptures and Calligraphy
Sale
Starts Live
10
to 17 Jan 2021
On
- Screen display Solo show
-
Thursday, 31 December 2020
51st IFFI : Raj Pritam More "Khisa"finds entry in Indian Panorama 2020.
India's Marathi short film''Khisa''(Pocket) is now making its way to India after acclaimed so many international awards. ''Khisa''short film Official Selected in Indian Panorama for 51st International film festival of India, Goa 2021.
The short film is Directed by Raj Pritam More. Produced by PP Cine Production Mumbai and Laaltippa Films. The film has been shot at Akola ( Vidarbha).
Khisa is the story of a young boy who lives in a remote village in Maharashtra. He decides to get a large pocket stitched for his school shirt, in which he keeps all his precious belongings - petals, coins, marble balls; A pocket, he is proud of. It sets him apart from others his age, whose pockets are not only smaller in comparison but also ordinary and similar to each other in appearance.The little boy does not understand the politics of symbolism that adults engage in, and his pocket soon becomes a point of contention amongst elders in the village .
Khisa is the directorial debut short film of the director Raj Pritam More which has got so many international awards, nominations and official selection. He quoted Khisa is the story of the loss of innocence and coming-of-age of a young boy, is ironically symbolic of the times we live in. Khisa is a heart touching tale of a boy which will definitely give the audience a different perspective.He further said that Marathi movies are reaching new heights every day. Marathi content is making its marks not only in the country but all over the world.This 15 minute film will make a place in everyone's heart.
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| Raj Pritam More |
From early this, short film ''Khisa'' won 2 Awards at the Istanbul Film Awards 2020.Best Film and Best Screenplay, 2 award international awards and in India very prestigious Screenplay Awards at 10th Dada Saheb Phalke Film Festival,New Delhi .India -20 .
Khisa also qualifies to compete for the prestigious Golden star Awards at the annual live screening gala of IFA, which will be held in Istanbul, Turkey in March 2021.
Also got a nomination for Best international Short Film and Best Director at Dublin International short and music festival 2020.Khisa also shown at world's premier online screening at (DISFMF) Dublin International short and music festival 20.
Khisa got 2 prestigious awards at Mumbai International cult Film Festival. BEST DEBUT DIRECTOR (MICFF GOLD) and BEST ACTOR IN SUPPORTING ROLE (SPECIAL JURY MENTION) . And it's also Official selection at Montreal Independent Film Festival Canada 2020 and 26th (KIFF) Kolkata International Film Festival 20. Official Selection at Dioroma International film festival 2020. Official Selection at (Jiff) Jaipur international film festival 2020.
Official Selection at Singapore international film festival 2020.
It's also Official Selection at Dioroma Indie Shorts Awards Buenos Aires, Argentina 2020.
''Khisa'' is also selected at Dharamshala International Film Festival and set to world premiere at the prestigious Dharamshala International Film Festival.
Written by Kailash Waghmare ,Short film editor Santosh Maithani, Director of Photography Simarjit Singh Suman, Music by Parijat Chakraborty, Sound recordist by Kushal Sarda. Kailash Waghmare,Meenakshi Rathod,Shruti Madhydeep ,Dr Sheshpal Ganvir and Vedant Shrisagar (child actor) are in the lead roles.
Tuesday, 29 December 2020
In their different ways, each of the nine artists in “The Winter Show” - 2020
At a moment when the world is under terrible threat from human activity and when the enormity of the challenge can leave one feeling mournful and overwhelmed, this exhibition offers a sense of solace, an occasion to remember how great our capacity to collaborate with nature actually is. In their different ways, each of the nine artists in“The Winter Show” — Ashok Namdeo Hinge, Pramod Apet, Rupesh Pawar, Santoshkumar Patil, Pravin Utge, Gunjan Shrivastava, Amit Bankar, Kranti Bankar, Prasanna Musale reach out to the natural environment for subject matter, for materials, for guidance. In the textured works of Ashok Hinge, for instance, the sheets of layered and folded. Prasanna Musale’s unique color and naturally occurring variation determines the palette and interplay of forms. The textures also play an important role in the work of Rupesh Pawar, but with distinctly different techniques andeffects. Preferring frottage to folding, Pawar lays his sheets and by rubbing inkstick and acrylic paint onto the traditional handmade paper he is able to create vigorous striated marks that he organizes into dense patterns that flood his works.
Amit Bankar’s mountainous forms on paper outnumber the naturally occurring but the overall structures, which can expand in profligate fashion like brambles, testify to the artist’s feeling for nature. Although the paintings by Kranti Bankar don’t feature any natural stone their effect rely on execution of charcoal on canvas, her subject matter clearly involves our relationship to the natural world. But a paean to nature isn’t the only thing on offer in “The Winter Show.” There is so much to be learned by looking at how the works of artist couples overlap and diverge.
The connection to organic growth and the interdependence of humans and animals in Santoshkumar’s work, as well as the sensitive attention to surfaces throughout, has a cumulative effect of slowing down your thoughts, heightening your senses, gently sweeping away the anxiety that increasingly permeates our thoughts. Perhaps this soothing effect has something to do with the handmade tactility of the work and the absence of all things electronic. All you need to make something worthy of attention, these artists remind us, is a rescued fragment of the natural world and a pair of hands.
Gunjan Shrivastava employs an abstract language that draws on natural phenomenon, but their differences are just as evident as she composes in planes and pursues translucency, and favors linear motifs and dramatic value shifts. Pervading her work is a conflation of the abstract and the everyday: her folded planar shards evoke the geometry of crystal formations, while her titles frequently allude to quotidian events and basic human relationships.
Pravin Utge explains that the essence of his work is to celebrate and sublimate the ordinary and noble life of Indian women. There are also some nice echoes between the two couples and the women he paints. Pramod Apet paints old cherished world and childhood memories which are now in the process of vanishing little by little. Also noticeable is the way in which Utge and Apet sometimes use very wide formats to envelope their viewers in a sublime expanse.
Over the last year there have been numerous exhibitions at Nippon but we still have some catching up to do when it comes to this group of artists. Among its other virtues, “The Winter Show” is a welcome opportunity to discover the work of 9 Indian artists whose work deserves to be better known. As you make your way through this exhibition, which offers a wonderfully generous selection of work, it’s also great to see more of the gradually emerging oeuvres of Artist which makes the botanical dimension of the show fascinating.
by
Moumita Sarkar
Artist/ Curator / Writer
Kolkata
The WINTER ART SHOW
Live : 15 to 31 December - 2020
Online Group show
Ashok Hinge I Pramod Apet I Santoshkumar R. Patil
Gunjan Shrivastava I Amit Bankar I Pravin Utge
Prasanna Musale I Rupesh Pawar I Kranti Bankar
Venue : www.nippongallery.com
Thursday, 24 December 2020
Wednesday, 2 December 2020
TARQ : YOU ARE ALL CAUGHT UP Sameer Kulavoor
About the Exhibition
3rd December- 7th January
2021
11:00 am – 6:30 pm | Tuesday – Saturday | By Appointment
The team at TARQ is delighted to present ‘YOU ARE ALL CAUGHT UP’ by Sameer
Kulavoor. This is his second solo exhibition at TARQ. The show is
made up of a series of paintings and drawings that are an expression of the
artist's understanding of the tumultuous historical moment that we
are currently experiencing. In this show, Kulavoor continues to be fascinated with
Social Media, and looks deeply at ideas of the personal and political through
the ubiquitous blue screen.
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Sameer Kulavoor, I LIKE IT. WHAT IS
IT?, Acrylic on canvas, 48 x
48 inches, 2019
While the artist has in some ways continued his unique observations of urban spaces – the
landscape he is intimately familiar with – he now
looks at these regular haunts through the lens of the growing pandemic. In this,
he grows curiouser and curiouser as to how and why people adapt to the times by
consuming content that is now readily available at your fingertips, and often
times, leads to an information overload. In many ways, his works are a
documentation of life not only in an urban metropolis but the restless mental
state of living through a time of political turmoil.
As a sign of the times, it is not uncommon to find the omnipresent cell phone in several works, serving to alienate, entertain and often, making the private, public. Kulavoor continues to question and dissect how humanity, as a whole, is adapting to and fighting against these unchartered territories seeking change.
About the Artist
Sameer Kulavoor (b.1983) is a visual artist living and
working in Mumbai, India. His work lies at the intersection of art, graphic
design & contemporary illustration and has taken the form of paintings,
murals, books, zines, prints and objects. He is interested in why things look
the way they do; constantly exploring and understanding the impact that time,
culture, politics and socio-economic conditions have on our visible and
invisible surroundings. In this age of visual overload, his work involves
filtering, dissecting, documenting and de-familiarizing commonly seen subjects
through the act of drawing, painting and design.
Some of the zines he has produced include Sidewalks & Coffeeshops (2009),
Zeroxwallah Zine (2011), The Ghoda Cycle Project (poster-book, 2012), Blued
(book/zine, 2013) and Oh Flip (flipbooks, 2013). He exhibited The Ghoda Cycle
Project at WDC Helsinki in 2012 and in Mumbai in 2013 while also collaborating
with Paul Smith on a series of Ghoda Cycle Tee-shirt designs which were
released worldwide. He presented select sketchbook drawings from between 2012
and 2016 as large serigraphs at Artisans', Kalaghoda, in a show titled 'Please
Have A Seat' (2016). He has been working on a number of large scale public art
projects and paintings which are on view in Auckland (New Zealand), Mumbai,
Bengaluru, Delhi and Chennai. ‘A Man of the Crowd’ (2018) was Kulavoor’s first
solo presentation at TARQ. Two of his new works were showcased at the TARQ
booth group show at India Art Fair in 2019. Most recently, his drawings and
paintings were part of ‘The Shifting City’ - Mumbai pavilion of ‘Making Heimat
- Arrival City’ at the Goethe Institut Max Mueller Bhavan curated by Kaiwan
Mehta.
Kulavoor was the founder of Bombay Duck Designs
which is presently directed by graphic artist + urdu/arabic typography
specialist, Zeenat Kulavoor. Along with artist/designer Lokesh Karekar
(Locopopo), Kulavoor also founded and curated six issues of 100%ZINE (currently
on hiatus) – a visual arts magazine that discovers and showcases a wide range
of visual art talent from India and abroad.
Digital Initiatives
As we continue to cope with the current coronavirus pandemic, the safety of our staff and visitors is our utmost priority. With various sanitization and safety measures in place, we invite you to the space to enjoy the artworks in the flesh – you can take an individual appointment with our team here. For those who are unable to come by, we are also making the exhibition more accessible online with a variety of digital initiatives.
Virtual Exhibition Visit: If you are unable to make it to the gallery in person, one of the team members will walk you through the exhibition on display virtually via Zoom. You can take an appointment here.
Interactive Viewing
Experience: We continue are collaboration with, Varun Ramanna and Charu Tak to
develop a new experience for every exhibition, one that accentuates, rather
than imitates the physical experience of visiting a show. Varun Ramanna is a
multidisciplinary artist and technologist working in projects ranging from
animation and VFX for television and film to new media and immersive
experiences for clients all over the world. Charu Tak is a programmer and game
developer. She predominantly works on new media projects for enterprise clients
but also on commercial and independent game projects.
Online Viewing Room: Exhibitions hosted at TARQ starting in April 2020 are available to view on www.tarq.in. Each online viewing room allows visitors to access the individual works in the show, accompanied by details, installation images and in some cases, short video snippets with the artist.
Digital Catalogue: Since
the inception of TARQ, we have published a catalogue for every exhibition,
which are available to read and buy in print at the gallery. Since the
pandemic, we have made all our past and current catalogues available online, so
that our audiences can read the scholarly essays, interviews and points of view
on the work that our artists do.
C.S.M. Marg, Apollo Bunder,
Colaba, Mumbai - 400 001.
Phone: +91 22 6615 0424Email: info@tarq.inTimings: 11AM–6.30PMOpen: Tuesday - Saturday
Tuesday, 1 December 2020
Nippon Gallery - The Natural Resurrection - Narratives in blue - by Gunjan Shrivastava
2020 is undeniably going to go down as one of the most eventful and an extraordinary year in history. The pandemonium of COVID-19 caught us off-guard and changed the way of life tagging it as new normal. This new normal indeed brought vivacity to long-overlooked “Mother Nature”. Conceptualized keeping the intriguing observations of natures evolvement through the pandemic, this collection embodies the healing process of the environment and its consequent resurrection.
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Governor of West Bengal Hon' Kesari Nath Tripathi with Gunjan Shrivastava cyanotype works 2019 |
And whilst the plague known to humankind lies stagnant, it is a marvel to watch nature reclaim and embrace itself; years and years of damage is being slowly healed, as in the short span of three weeks we see the Earth healing itself. The past century left mankind convinced that industrialization is human progress, and that the latter cannot coexist with the natural world. It took for the world to come to a standstill to remind us of the fact that we are, in fact, a part of this physical world. We are suddenly made aware of the notion that perhaps, there is a path for us to thrive without destroying that which surrounds us.
This collection is a call to action. By restoring degraded ecosystems and engaging in co-evolutionary processes, humankind can coexist, and even thrive by developing nature's wealth. This is our chance to identify it not as a plague, but as a cure.
As an artist, years of my consciousness towards sustainability inspires me to explore cyanotypes which is a beautiful process of natural phenomenon. It is a meditative experience to see the sun as the source of energy, which magically translates my subjects into profoundly soulful works of art. Adding my signature touch to the collection, it further explores the theme of natural decay with broken leaves printed onto the paper, and are completed with embroidery using red fine string. The colour red here symbolizes blood veins. Metaphorically, the print of the leaf stands to portray that the elements present are natural. My body of works embarks on the awareness to restore the belief in redemptive restoration and emboldens better environmental practice to reclaim what is degraded, damaged and destroyed.
Nippon Gallery is pleased to announce the launching of online solo exhibition
"The Natural Resurrection"
-Narratives in blue -
By
Gunjan Shrivastava
Online Solo Show
Contemporary Art Gallery Hall – 1
2nd to 9th December -2020
Thursday, 26 November 2020
The Natural Resurrection - Narratives in blue By Gunjan Shrivastava Online Solo Show
NIPPON GALLERY
30/32, 2nd Floor, Deval Chambers,
Nanabhai Lane, Flora Fountain, Fort, Mumbai – 400 001 India.
Email: info@nippongallery.com
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