Date – 14.10.23 – 31.12.23
Venue – Gallery 1, Ground Floor, Emami Art
About IMAGINARIUM Open Call
IMAGINARIUM 3.0 is the third edition of Emami Art’s Annual Open Call for degree final-year students and young artists who completed post-graduation within the last three years (between 22 to 35 years of age) and self-taught artists (35 years and below as of 30th April 2023). Emami Art actively supports and promotes talented artists across India. Our annual awards, exhibition and residency programmes have provided support, mentorship and a platform for discourse to emerging artists since 2020. An invited panel of eminent jurors selected ten artists for the exhibition and awards, out of which the first three winners will be awarded INR 2.0 Lakh for the first awardee, INR 1.5 Lakh for the second awardee and INR 1.0 Lakh for the third awardee on the opening day of the exhibition.
About IMAGINARIUM 3.0
IMAGINARIUM 3.0 showcases an eclectic selection of works across mediums, styles and forms. The diverse and rich collection of works in the show is an interwoven mesh of strong contemporary imaginations through meaningful expansion and a great sense of innovation. The participating artists Ushnish Mukhopadhyay (First Awardee), Aritra Majumder (Second Awardee), Richa Arya (Third Awardee), Ahalya Rajendran, Ali Nakbhi, Deepak Kumar, Saroj Kumar Badatya, Sheshadev Sagria, Sumon Mondal, Swapna Halder meticulously explore their medium and showcase their most recent works.
Ushnish Mukhopadhyay’s works range from drawings to animated videos with sound to sculptural installations with electric circuits, following an archival logic of citation to explore the dark, violent and morbid perceptions of the phenomenon of death and its imaginative possibilities. Aritra Majumder makes his grids by maintaining a particular geometric format layer after layer and revealing a free-flowing visual, the balance between these two harmonies developing in a manner that traces the existence through splatters, marks, and stains in modern and urban sophistication. Richa Arya’s practice is an attempt at a visual articulation of women and vulnerable voices from the margins broadly dealing with gender-based inequalities, patriarchy, and questions in and around the female agency in the light of religious and moral conservatism. Being born and raised in a farming family, Ahalya Rajendran’s paintings narrate the innocent experiences that combine with the most intimate memories of her village. Ali Nakhbi’s visualisation comes from his interaction with his surroundings and the relation between the state of his mind and the state of the environment. Through his art practice, Deepak Kumar explores the consequences of uncontrolled urbanisation and its effects on ecological health and diversity. Saroj Kumar Badatya traces the changes in abandoned places through his woodcut works. He uses both the print and the block as layers of his process. The composition and angles allude to the changing land in multiple ways. Sheshadev Sagria’s works speculate an alternative body and narrate an alternative world of marginalised people. Different philosophies of ‘alienation’ have been crucial for his practice to examine and articulate some of these complexities. Sumon Mondal explores the idea of crowds through various materials and methods, articulating its diversity and characteristics on multiple levels. Swapna Halder’s artworks are powerful, personalised expressions of vulnerabilities. They admit weakness, memory, pain and anxiety in the most captivating ways.
