Download Press Release (PDF 40 K)
July 2005 New York - Bose Pacia Gallery presents photography and installation works by
Subodh Gupta, L.N. Tallur and
Rashid Rana from July 19th through August 20th, 2005. The gallery is located at 508 West 26th Street on the 11th Floor, in the Chelsea district of New York City. There will be an opening reception on Tuesday, July 19th, from 6 to 8pm.Please note that summer hours in the month of August are Monday - Friday from 12 to 6 pm and by appointment.
Delhi-based artist Subodh Gupta's photographs follow his usual trajectory of picking up on common place objects and scenarios of everyday life in India. He has chosen particular sites (the train station platform) or constructions (a temporary home built from refuse, a corner of his family home in Patna) that bear a resemblance to quotidian examples found anywhere in India. Subodh Gupta has exhibited widely in North America, Asia and Europe. Recent exhibitions include, Venice Biennale (Venice 2005); Edge of Desire, Asia Society (New York 2005); Universal Experience: Art, Life, and the Tourist's Eye, MCA Chicago, (Chicago 2005); Musio Temporario, Lisbon (2004); The Havanna Biennale, curated by Hilda Rodriques (Cuba 2003); The Tree from the Seed, Henie Onstad Kunstsenter (Norway 2003); Under Construction, Japan Foundation (Japan 2002), This Side is the Other Side (Geneva 2002); and Kapital and Karma, Kunsthalle (Vienna 2002).
Rashid Rana questions how meaning is misconstrued in our media oriented society by creating images that force an acknowledgement of multiple viewpoints and identities. In each case, there is an ironic complexity set up between the large image (that which one first sees) and the smaller images from which it is constructed (readable only upon closer inspection of the work). In the Ommatidia series, portraits of the three current Bollywood heroes (Shah Rukh Kahn, Salman Kahn and Hrithrik Roshan) have been constructed from portraits of average men on the streets of Pakistan. (Ommatidia is the word used to describe the multiple lens eye of a fly.) In these works, the artist comments on the construction of national and cultural identities. In the large multi-panel work, All Eyes Skyward During the Annual Parade, Rana portrays a crowd at an official government parade in Pakistan which has been constructed from thousands of stills from Bollywood (Indian) films. Rashid Rana was trained at the National School of Arts in Lahore and the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston. His works have been included in the Fukuoka Triennale, Fukuoka, (Japan 2005); Across the Borders: Art from Pakistan, National Gallery of Modern Art, Mumbai, (India 2005); Freewaves Media Festival, Museum of Contemporary Art, (Los Angeles 2004) and the 9th Cairo International Biennale (Egypt 2003).
L.N. Tallur's interactive installations are intriguing, rough and ready bazaar like objects shot through with ironic humor. Tallur's works are vinyl sculptures which are inflated with air but the viewer also encounters the works deflated, flat and lifeless. Black Humor is a cityscape or group of buildings; Man Carrying a Halo is a self-portrait; and the third work, Mushroom, is a large pillow-like form printed with a crowd scene. The works require the viewer to be patient to observe their transformations, to watch as the objects or images become readable, and to question at which point the sculpture is "complete" or "finished. Tallur has exhibited works widely in India and in North America. Recent exhibitions include Edge of Desire, Asia Society (NY, 2005); MusioTemporario, Lisbon (2004); Leeds Metropolitan University Gallery, (Leeds 2001); Art in the world, Beaux-Art Magazine (Paris 1999). The artist lives and works in Bangalore, India.