The exhibition started on 12th February and will continue till 29th March, 2022 at Emami Art, Kolkata
The Politics of Paper assembles together distinct art practices engaging with Paper as a support, a material, a concept, a process and/or other intellectual engagements from individual, formal, historical, socio-cultural, political perspectives to name. The exhibition will address a renewed interest by contemporary artists in the medium of Paper as integral to their practice and also as a point of departure.
Due to its inherent intellectual flexibility (the ability to adapt to changing circumstances rapidly), Paper is woven into the very fabric of human history and has proven itself to be an extremely versatile artistic vehicle. It allows the exploration of complex narratives- social, historical, conceptual, formal or otherwise. Paper had consolidated its position as a significant contemporary medium with the purchase it had gained during the 1970s when drawing came into its own as a critical language of art. In a world more and more geared towards the digital, where ‘going paperless’ is becoming a clarion call, Paper has by no means lost its value and mark making still retains its intrinsic nature as a vital gestural behavior.
Curated by Ushmita Sahu, The Politics of Paper talks about engagements and explorations of Paper and tries to establish a visual context of the expanding boundaries through several works and approaches by ten Internationally renowned artists namely – Adip Dutta, Anju Dodiya, Atul Dodiya ,Chandra Bhattacharya, Jagannath Panda, Jayashree Chakravarty, Mithu Sen, N S Harsha, Prasanta Sahu and TV Santosh.
For each artist within the show, Paper embodies ideas of accretion and transformation that predicates a uniqueness of language and approach. By trying to connect diverse approaches the exhibition becomes a site of collaborations with multiple entry and exit ways.
In addition to this there will be collateral events which will include presentations by the artists and engagement with students of art colleges from the state. A seven day workshop will be designed around the exploration of paper which will also include some of the senior artists and selected young upcoming artists from the region.