In the series, his palette of black, white and sepia tones recalls the iconic vintage Bollywood posters of his youth, and the photo-realistic tradition of the 1960s and 70s. Superimposed with ASCII code, however, these images become icons of a different sort. Under his artistic influence, the American Standard Code for Information Interchange, originally developed as telegraphic code, gets transformed into an existential commentary.
The question raised here is about ‘the significance of mythic vocabulary, when modern icons are nothing but virtual symbols of themselves?’ The artist states:
"I certainly see virtualization and gradual relocation of our everyday activities from the realm of the real into virtual data space as the most important signifier or marker that identifies the present historic moment. The attempt is to capture this particular marker and also re-assert theBorn in Kerala in 1956, Baiju Parthan studied Painting at Goa College of Art from 1978-83 and has received a Master's degree in Philosophy from The Mumbai University. He has featured in several major group and solo exhibitions in India and worldwide, comprising Galerie Christian Hosp, Austria; Anant Gallery, Delhi; Aicon Gallery, NY; and the Ninth Asian Bienniale, Dhaka in 1999.
physicality of the photographic image.”
A curatorial note to his latest show mentions: "Citing Sartre's book L'age de Raison, Jungian psychoanalysis, Joan Miró and the Surrealist Manifesto, and traditional Indian mysticism as sources of inspiration, Parthan creates his own rich, contemporary mythic language in a search for meaning."
This language, as art scholar Ranjit Hoskote explains, holds secret signals for us, directives pointing to virtual universes that begin at the threshold of the everyday reality we know, threads into hidden archives of continuity.
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