Sunday, May 26, 2013

‘A view to infinity’ at KNMA

In Indian Modernism’s history, Nasreen Mohamedi sure is a special figure who opted to move away from the mainstream practice of the first few years of post-Independent art. She chose the less explored non-representational trajectory. The artist was impulsively drawn to ‘space’ sans engaging in reconfiguring the realm in images’. Her works were often inspired by both the underlying structures evident in Nature and man-made environs, architecture in particular, geometry as well as.

A Retrospective of the celebrated practitioner’s vast oeuvre curated by Roobina Karode takes place at KNMA, Delhi. This exhibit collates a vast body of work, looking to draw strong connections between her works of art from the early 1960s right to the 80s. It intends to highlight the singular vision running through the notes from her personal diaries, to her early paintings, photographs, drawings and collages.

An accompanying note elaborates: “The optical, metaphysical and mystical is overlapped in her quest for a non-material, non-objective world. Her artistic journey, marked by rigors of self-restraint and self-discipline, involved acts of renunciation- of objects, figures, decoration, narration and excess.

Nasreen Mohamedi gradually arrived at an interiorized vision that was articulated in a sparse aesthetics as well as frugal means of art making, utilizing pencil and ink pen so as to plot a phenomenological experience. This breathed life into her lines, which often was restless and always at the edge for embracing a view to infinity.

While studying under her at the Faculty of Fine Arts, MS University of Baroda, and also as her neighbor, Roobina Karode came to know the artist closely through several interactions with her for over a decade from 1977 to 1990. The former spent a lot of time at her studio-cum-home, and shared the sensitive artist’s persona with art lovers through rare insights and personal anecdotes noted by her into Nasreen’s self-evolving discipline, regarding to both, her life and art. The interaction is first in the series of talks at KNMA on her art pedagogy, practice and oeuvre.

No comments:

Post a Comment