|
Indepth Arts News:
"Drawing Space: Contemporary Indian Drawings"
2000-10-07 until 2000-11-19
Institute of International Visual Arts
London, ,
UK
The
intimate connection between Britain and India maps an unusual path
through contemporary drawing and the history of Company paintings.
In the nineteenth century, Company paintings led to a new relationship
between Indian artists and their colonial patrons, the East India
Company. These artists were schooled in the tradition of easel painting
and they were employed to depict the life of the British in India.
Within this context, the drawn line was used as a means of defining
social and physical space.
Drawing Space is an exhibition
of contemporary drawings by three artists, all of whom use the drawn
line as a device for negotiating space in ways that are self-empowering,
exploring the complexity of making and exhibiting work in an increasingly
global context.
Nasreen
Mohamedi, Sheela Gowda and N.S.Harsha's practice encompasses
visual forms from the West filtered through an Indian sensibility.
Mohamedi's fine line drawing both adopts and subverts its point of
reference appropriating the grid and departing from it with the
diagonal. Gowda's restrained and complex installations connect
with and extend the parameters of craft traditions by creating
three-dimensional drawings in space. In Harsha's wall drawings,
the tradition of botanical illustration becomes a fragile dream
world threatened by the imposition of industrialisation and
progress.
Curated
by Suman Gopinath and Grant Watson
Co-produced
by inIVA and Beaconsfield in collaboration with the Victoria and
Albert Museum.
Related Links:
| | 
|
