Tsuktiben Jamir
One of India’s most significant art galleries Nature Morte based in Delhi, is primarily known for showcasing and promoting contemporary works by mostly South Asian artists. They are currently hosting ‘Heed the Portent’, a solo exhibition by Mona Rai. Having started on the 15th of March 2023, the show is set to be on view till the 8th of April.
Born in 1947 in New Delhi, Rai completed her Master’s Degree in Psychology from Delhi University Rai before enrolling at Triveni Kala Sangam in New Delhi to study painting which is also where she held her first solo exhibition in the year 1974. Her work consists of abstracted colour fields that shimmer and move in the light and is inspired by the manufacture of crafts and ritual art. Intriguingly, Mona Rai’s paintings have a sense of tension and struggle. She is known for her unique techniques of making art; she frequently shreds, slices, or burns her canvases, and she occasionally even uses cobblers to repair the frames for her pieces. Mona likes to work with every medium she can find, including shiny materials like gold and silver foil as well as oil and acrylic paints.
Nature Morte perfectly encapsulates her direction and style as an artist, “Ms. Rai is very much an iconoclast in the context of contemporary art in India, remaining steadfastly committed to an aggressive form of abstraction within a milieu that is very much dominated by decorative and figurative painting. She explores the expressive potentials of different materials such as metallic foils, fabrics, glitter, sand, gravel, dirt and ash in her paintings and works on paper. Her process is rooted in risk-taking. Many of her works resemble battlegrounds: scorched, trampled, slit, wounded, scratched, scarred, bleeding, and weeping, to rend objects into emotional states and aesthetic challenges. At other times, she creates shimmering fields of colors that dazzle and oscillate in the light, with imagery informed by craft production and ritual art forms found in multiple religious contexts.”
Courtesy: Mutual Art
They have also asserted that the exhibition will feature a variety of Rai’s works from 1976 to 2008, showcasing the depth of her use of many mediums on canvas but avoiding any easy categorization as “painting” per se. Ms. Rai’s abstraction uses a vocabulary that draws inspiration from both expressionism and minimalism to create the impression of polyphony.
Rai has taken part in numerous national and international exhibitions over the course of her extensive career, including Nature Morte in New Delhi, Gallery Maya in London, Gallery F.I.A. in Amsterdam, Gallery Espace in New Delhi, Gallery Augustine in Hofheim, Germany, Sakshi Gallery in Madras, Gallery Aurobindo in New Delhi, Lalit Kala Academy in New Delhi, and Gallery Chemould in Mumbai.
Mona Rai speaks their thoughts in a fair and unbiased manner through her art. “Spontaneous she may be, but never wimpy.” She prefers her practise to be a gradual, deliberate and methodical process. The exhibition is definitely going to be a testimony of her great affinity for art as well as the magic she creates with her hands.
Dates:
15 March—8 April 2023
