Prabhavathi Meppayil and Raqib Shaw’s works at Asian Art Museum

We take a quick look at artistic inspirations of two talented artists from India, Prabhavathi Meppayil and Raqib Shaw, whose works form part of a grand show at San Francisco-based Asian Art Museum

Artist Prabhavathi Meppayil hails from a family of goldsmiths. ‘Process’ for her, is the mystical memory of hands. Employing traditional goldsmith techniques, her compositions incorporate delicate metallic strands that are embedded into lime gesso. Meditation and precision form the crux of her work. A meditative silence as if, seems to evoke through surface and object even as images emerge and fade away alternately. Politicization seeps into her artworks from the very choice of method and material; the craft and its tool are central to her visual expression.

The London Telegraph has termed Raqib Shaw ‘a vibrant artist who is clearly destined for greatness’. Born in Kolkata, he spent the early formative years in Kashmir, and was deeply influenced by an amalgamation of Buddhist, Hindu, Christian and Muslim cultures. Heavily populated with fantastical creatures and Dense in information, his work carries intricate detailing, jewel-like surfaces, and rich color. It contrasts the intensely violent and sexual nature of its innate imagery.

Since 1998, he has lived and worked in the city of London, where his love for the visual and poetic cultures of both East and West continues to inspire his art practice. Taking themes and symbols from Milton’s ‘Paradise Lost’, the artist summons a realm of cultural contradictions, also drawing from personal experience and dream psychology. According to him, this process suggests ‘shamanic practices wherein people dance wildly or use channeling so as to establish contact with the other side.’ 

Partnering curator Mami Kataoka points out that Asia is not a timeless construct; the region is rather an ever-evolving concept, which can well generate a new awareness of our existence in this complex world. To underline these points of view, many regional artists’ works of art are situated among traditional objects in region-specific galleries of the museum. A case in point is hedonistic, dreamlike canvases by Raqib Shaw (India/UK) in the South Asian galleries.

The sensitive Kashmiri artist fuses influences as vast and vivacious as Japanese screens, Hieronymus Bosch paintings, and Mughal miniatures. His style is both fastidious and opulent: his materials mostly include glitter, rhinestones, industrial paint etc, all painstakingly applied with a porcupine quill.