Fotofest Biennial – “India: Looking in.” March 10 – April 22, 2018
INDIA – Contemporary Photographic and New Media Art
March 10 – April 22, 2018 Houston, Texas USA
FotoFest 2018 Biennial Artists
Exhibition Features 48 Contemporary Photographic and New Media Artists from India
From the series NPNR. Courtesy of the artist
FotoFest International is pleased to announce the names of the 48 featured artists in the central exhibition for its upcoming FOTOFEST 2018 BIENNIAL, March 10 – April 22, 2018. Dedicated to INDIA: Contemporary Photographic and New Media Art,FotoFest 2018 speaks to a number of contemporary issues in India including gender and sexuality, land rights conflict, the environment, human settlement and migration, and caste and class divisions. The participating artists are from India and the global Indian diaspora.
Organized by Lead Curator Sunil Gupta and FotoFest Executive Director Steven Evans, FotoFest 2018 will be one of the largest exhibitions of contemporary photography by artists of Indian origin to be presented in the United States. The artists were handpicked by Mr. Gupta and Mr. Evans while journeying through multiple cities in India and across the world.
FOTOFEST 2018 BIENNIAL ARTISTS
| Indu Antony (Bangalore, India) Pablo Bartholomew (Delhi, India) Atul Bhalla (Delhi, India) Mohini Chandra (Fiji/UK/Australia) Sheba Chhachhi (Ethiopia/Delhi, India) Serena Chopra (Delhi, India) Tenzing Dakpa (Delhi, India) Sarindar Dhaliwal (Canada/Mumbai, India) Anita Dube (Delhi, India) Gauri Gill (Delhi, India) Chandan Gomes (Delhi, India) Shilpa Gupta (Mumbai, India) Shivani Gupta (Goa, India) Vinit Gupta (Delhi, India) Apoorva Guptay (Mumbai, India) Abhishek Hazra (Bangalore, India) Sohrab Hura (Delhi, India) Manoj Kumar Jain (Delhi, India) Samar Singh Jodha (Dubai, UAE) Ranbir Kaleka (Delhi, India) Rashmi Kaleka (Delhi, India) Jitish Kallat (Mumbai, India) Max Kandhola (Birmingham, UK) Roshini Kempadoo (UK/Guyana) |
Asif Khan (Delhi, India) Anita Khemka and Imran B. Kokiloo (Delhi, India) Sandip Kuriakose (Delhi, India) Dhruv Malhotra (Delhi, India) Arun Vijai Mathavan (Ahmedabad, India) Annu Palakunnathu Matthew (UK/USA) Uzma Mohsin (Delhi, India) Nandini Valli Muthiah (Chennai, India) Pushpamala N. (Bangalore, India) Dileep Prakash (Delhi, India) Ram Rahman (Delhi, India) Raqs Media Collective (Delhi, India) Anoop Ray (Delhi, India) Vicky Roy (Delhi, India) Vidisha Saini (Delhi, India) Hemant Sareen (Delhi, India) Gigi Scaria (Delhi, India) Mithu Sen (Delhi, India) Rishi Singhal (Gandhinagar, India) Leila Sujir (Montréal, Canada) Ishan Tankha (Delhi, India) Prince Varughese Thomas (Houston, USA) Anusha Yadav (Mumbai, India) |
“The artists, all of Indian origin, are imagining and responding to what India means today in its myriad complexities, given its ancient culture and more recent emancipation from British colonialism,” says Biennial Lead Curator Sunil Gupta. “They were selected by a process of portfolio reviews and face-to-face meetings with nearly three times as many artists than are in the show. The final short list was arrived at by assessing the engagement of their works with both the issues and the technology that define photography in the world today.”
“It is very exciting for FotoFest to be working with this remarkable range of artists,” says Steven Evans, FotoFest Executive Director and Biennial Co-Curator. “Some are well known to those familiar with the international world of contemporary art, while others will be new discoveries, as they are exhibiting internationally for the first time. We are looking forward to bringing this work together under the rubric of the FotoFest Biennial, and to be featuring their work in the new hardcover book inspired by the exhibition. Our goal is to bring new attention to this work, and to contribute scholarship on these artists, the region, and the diaspora of Indian origin.”
Highlights include Indu Antony (Bangalore, India) who will present photographs of drag kings from her ManiFest series, exploring representation of gender and sexuality; Sheba Chhachhi (Ethiopia/Delhi, India) whose work addresses the environment and eco-philosophy; Vicky Roy (Delhi, India), whose long-term documentation of young street children is a reflection of his own personal history as a child runaway; Shilpa Gupta, among the best known contemporary artists in the exhibition, who will show a large-scale interactive video work; Asif Khan (Delhi, India) who will show works from his Muzaffarnagar series documenting refugee camps and rehabilitation colonies; and Max Kandhola (Birmingham, UK) who will present new work from his series Roti Kapta aur Makaan, examining racial dynamics and migration in England.
The 2018 Biennial will be the first time that FotoFest has focused so directly on South Asia. As a platform for art and ideas, FotoFest has a long history of focusing international attention on emerging and under-known regions, including Latin America (1992), Korea (2000), China (2008), Russia (2012), and the Arab World (2014), showcasing hundreds of artists and in many cases introducing their work to the United States. FotoFest is also an international platform, and exposure at the FotoFest Biennial has often led to wider exposure overseas as well.
The INDIA: Contemporary Photographic and New Media Art exhibition will be presented at three adjacent converted warehouse art spaces in Houston’s Washington Avenue Arts District, and in a new collaboration, in the Louisa Sarofim Gallery at Asia Society Texas Center in the Houston Museum District.
In addition to the INDIA exhibitions, the FotoFest 20018 Biennial features a number of related programs, including a two-day INDIA Symposium, presented in partnership with Asia Society Texas Center and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; a film program, presented with the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; artist talks and tours; family; literary; and culinary events. FotoFest and Schilt Publishing, Amsterdam, will publish a hardcover book to accompany the program, with reproductions from Biennial artists, and essays from experts on contemporary art and the region.
ADDITIONAL BIENNIAL PROGRAMS
Concurrent to the INDIA exhibitions, FotoFest continues its acclaimed International MEETING PLACE Portfolio Review for Artists, a 12-day long event that connects over 450 artists with over 150 national and international photography industry leaders and decision makers. The Meeting Place remains the most international and largest portfolio review program of its kind in the world. Attendees come from over 34 nations.
The Meeting Place, and the 2018 INDIA exhibitions will be accompanied by the non-thematic, biennial exhibition, the Discoveries of the Meeting Place, an exhibition of works by 10 artists selected by as many curators from the previous Meeting Place Portfolio Review in 2016. The exhibition has become an important imprimatur for emerging photographic artists.
FotoFest’s International Fine Print Auction will take place on Monday, March 19, 2018, in conjunction with a special program for collectors. The FotoFest Fine Print Auction presents over 65 works through a curated selection of particularly high-quality, international contemporary artwork. It is FotoFest’s principal fundraiser, occurring only once every two years. The 2018 Auction will be conducted by Denise Bethel, former Chair of Photographs, Americas, Sotheby’s, Inc.
Over 100 independent museums, art galleries, non-profit art centers and corporate spaces will participate in the FotoFest 2018 Biennial by presenting photography and photography events during the festival’s six weeks. Among these spaces are the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, who will present an exhibition by highly acclaimed Indian photographer Raghubir Singh; and the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, which is presenting the collaborative work of FotoFest Biennial Lead Curator Sunil Gupta and his artistic partner Charan Singh.
> More Information on the FotoFest 2018 Biennial INDIA Exhibitions
FOTOFEST 2018 BIENNIAL SPONSORS
Early supporters of the FotoFest 2018 Biennial include The Brown Foundation Inc., Houston Endowment, Inc., The Eleanor and Frank Freed Foundation, the City of Houston through the Houston Arts Alliance, The Wortham Foundation, Texas Commission on the Arts, The Powell Foundation, Anne and Albert Chao, The Whitehall Houston Hotel, Silver Street Studios, and the FotoFest Board of Directors.