National Art Week of New Media in Chandigarh

Leading artists have gathered for the first National Art Week of New Media in Chandigarh.

The event is a joint initiative of Chandigarh Lalit Kala Akademi and the National Lalit Kala Akademi. The six-day panorama will include some of India’s most important art personalities - critics, historians, editors of art journals and artists, - — get together. The event, which will take place from September 21 to 26,

According to its chairperson Diwan Manna, the art platform has been conceptualized for viewing, discussing and understanding specific concerns of contemporary artists. It will also try to explore new avenues, mediums and intrinsic possibilities within visual arts with art connoisseurs, art historians, scholars, critics, and even students. He has been quoted as saying: “Lectures, panel discussions, slide shows, exhibition of works from the collection of LKA, Delhi, will make the event absorbing and interactive. Art lovers will be excited at the myriad possibilities in art practice and appreciation.”

Keeping in view the Akademi’s work in Chandigarh, National Akademi has supported and funded the event. Among those participating in the event is Bharti Kher, an artist who works with a wide range of media from installation to painting, and digital photography to sculpture. Her practice interrogates the relationship between ‘traditional’ and ‘modern’, to address issues of identity, feminism, consumerism, race and class. Sudarshan Shetty has long been recognized as one of his generation’s most innovative conceptual artists.

Founded in 1992 in Delhi by Monica Narula, Shuddhabrata Sengupta and Jeebesh Bagchi,, the hybrid practice of Raqs is as expressively poetic as it’s rigorously analytical. The Media Collective has curated exhibits, edited books, collaborated with architects, writers and theatre directors, and staged innovative events, founding processes that have greatly impacted contemporary art in India. Jiten Thukral and Sumir Tagra’s collaborative work in painting, sculpture, video, graphic design, installation, product design, websites, music and fashion has been equally appreciated.