7th edition of Delhi Contemporary Art Week

The 7th edition of Delhi Contemporary Art Week(DCAW) is once again showcasing the best of South Asian art and contemporary voices at Bikaner House from August 31st to September 4th, 2024. A creative alliance forged by six galleries, DCAW is anchored in the foundation of amplifying the voices of creative artists and celebrating their works that are a reflection of contemporary times with a multitude of themes and techniques. 

In this year’s edition, Art Mumbai will co-host the opening night and a public walkthrough, led by Associate Director, Art Mumbai - Teesta Bhandare & curator Girish Shahane, on the 31st of August at 11am.

Furthermore, the show will be accompanied by two thematic exhibitions – “Threads that Bare”, dedicated to bringing together textile artists from across India whose practices explore the myriad possibilities of fibre and yarn as art medium, and “A Bold Step Sideways” curated by Girish Shahane.

“Threads That Bare” showcases a dynamic interplay, highlighting how today's artists draw upon the rich textile traditions of India to create works that are as layered and complex as the history they represent. Through the manipulation of fabric, thread, and texture, these artists reveal not only the enduring beauty of Indian textiles but also their capacity to communicate profound stories and emotions in the language of contemporary art. This show aims to present how Indian textiles have transcended their conventional roles to become powerful mediums of expression and how the adaptability of textile art allows for a confluence of the old and the new, creating works that are at once deeply rooted in heritage and resonant with contemporary narratives. Artists today are reinterpreting traditional textile techniques—such as weaving, embroidery, Zardosi, and Kantha—infusing them with modern sensibilities to address themes of identity, memory, and socio-political discourse.

The show will feature a total of 14 artists selected from the six galleries — Geeta Khandelwal & Udita Upadhyaya from Blueprint 12, Sumakshi Singh & Sunaina Bhalla from Exhibit 320, Puneet Kaushik from Gallery Espace, Khadim Ali, Veena Advani & Viraj Khanna from Latitude 28, Anoli Perera & Natasha Das from Shrine Empire, and Anita Dube, Osman Yousefzada, Pranati Panda & Ruby Chishti from Vadehra Art Gallery.

This year’s curation by Girish Shahane is titled ‘A Bold Step Sideways’ that highlights art/artists that sidesteps traditional notions of art and history. Embracing a generation of artists unencumbered by the anxieties of influence, this exhibition showcases a diverse array of works that freely traverse styles and mediums. Unlike previous eras marked by ironic references and postmodern pastiche, today's artists navigate a cultural landscape where historical time converges like apps on a smartphone, accessible everywhere at once. This flattening of time fosters a unique artistic freedom, where abstraction and figuration coexist harmoniously alongside personal narratives and explorations of identity. As we delve into artworks that reflect personal histories and community narratives, ‘A Bold Step Sideways' reveals how performativity in social media has elevated the autobiographical, making personal and political identities central to contemporary discourse. This curation aims to celebrate a profound shift in artistic perspective, where stepping sideways replaces the avant-garde leap forward, and where art history evolves in tandem with the complexities of our interconnected world.

Blueprint12 would be exhibiting works of selected artists, such as Divyesh Undaviya, Meghana Gavireddygari, Zoya Chaudhary, Aravani Art Project, Anila Govindappa, among others.

Exhibit 320 showcases contemporary art from India and the subcontinent, creating a platform for new thoughts and ideas. This year, the emphasis of the exhibition space is on new media, and its structures as a place for creative endeavor, aesthetic exploration and furthering visual dialogue. Our aim has always been to discover and encourage new and emerging talent. The gallery will be exhibiting the works of Deena Pindoria, Deepak Kumar, Jayati Kaushik, Kaushik Saha, Kumaresan Selvaraj, Priyantha Udagedara, Gopi Gajwani, Gunjan Kumar, Rahul Kumar, Sareena Khemka, Sunaina Bhalla, Sumakshi Singh, among others.

In this edition, Gallery Espace is showcasing a lively and varied collection of paintings, drawings and sculptures by leading artists across generations and graphic mediums. A highlight of the presentation is a drawing installation by Soma Surovi Jannat, a young artist from Dhaka, Bangladesh who has recently signed up with Gallery Espace. “Time without Birth and Death” is an intricate work that explores the concept of cyclical existence, of birth and death, conveying through motif and form, a sense of infinity and the continuity of nature. Soma, who did her MFA at  Visva Bharati, Santiniketan (2016), was recipient of the Samdani Art Award in 2020 and participated in the Frere Hall South Asian Artist in Residence program at the Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford. 

Gallery Espace will also showcase a new set of paintings by Baroda-based Rashmimala, depicting the ground plant species specific to the Delhi ridge which she studied at a residency organised by Gallery Espace last year, Ravi Agarwal’s photographs of an abandoned office, and Tanmoy Samanta’s luminous canvases of liminal shapes. The exhibiting artists are: Amit Ambalal, Ishita Chakraborty, Rashmimala, Ravi Agarwal, Sharad Sonkusale, Sheetal Gattani, Sonia Mehra Chawla, Soma Surovi Jannat and Tanmoy Samanta.

Latitude 28 illuminates emerging artists from the Global South to underscore South Asia's ever-growing contemporary art scene. At the seventh edition of DCAW, we are excited to showcase an excellent lineup of artists that we have been showcasing every year with some new additions. Ankush Safaya, Harman Taneja, and Shalina Vichitra, have created new works which articulate the ideas of belonging, synonymous with ‘home’, within the expanse of the urban cityscape. Inspirations from the texture and form of Indian textile handicrafts and the miniature tradition are witnessed in the works of Sanket Viramgami. Sudipta Das metamorphoses Hanji paper into shapes of sculpture and fabric.

Through an array of vibrant textiles, the special exhibit includes Khadim Ali's monumental tapestry work rooted in his Afghan heritage. Making their debut are artists Al-Qawi Nanavati who infuses her late mother's belongings into her art, creating an aura of contemplation and connection; Viraj Khanna’s narrative-based embroidered works are attentive to quirky moments shared on social media; Harisha Chennangod’s paintings represent the tension between structure and freedom to create a visual simulation of textile; and veteran textile designer Veena Advani creates mixed media Ikat paintings with hand embroidery. The collection reinforces the rich histories and dynamic possibilities of textile art in contemporary visual practice through the techniques of weaving, crochet, embroidery, Zardosi, and Kantha, as the artists reconfigure fabric. The integration of multiple textile crafts with art forms and textures adds nuanced meaning to the artwork. Additionally, the artist list includes Anupama Alias, Chandan Bez Baruah, Farhat Ali, Harisha Chennangod, Jahangir Asgar Jani, Prajjwal Choudhury, Shubham Kumar, Waswo X. Waswo, Gopa Trivedi, and Zahra Yazdani.

Shrine Empire will be showing the works of Hema Shironi and Natasha Das for the first time, both artists work with textile and through this medium, they explore various contexts that relate to their personal histories, politics of the region and sustainability. We are also representing Amitava Das from this year and will be showing several of his recent works. Other participating artists are Anoli Perera, Arun Dev, Awdhesh Tamrakar, Divya Singh, Sajan Mani, Samanta Batra Mehta, Sangita Maity, Shruti Mahajan and Tayeba Begum Lipi.

Vadehra Art Gallery's presentation features an ensemble of exciting South Asian artists practicing within the Subcontinent and beyond – including Anita Dube, Anju Dodiya, Atul Bhalla, Atul Dodiya, Faiza Butt, Gigi Scaria, Jagannath Panda, Jasmine Nilani Joseph, Joya Mukerjee Logue, Praneet Soi, Sachin George Sebastian, Shailesh B.R., Shilpa Gupta, Sudhir Patwardhan, Sunil Gupta, Treibor Mawlong, Zaam Arif and others. 

Gathered for a democratic and diverse audience, their curation will include works across mediums, with a focus on painting and photography, ushering in reflection and discourse on topical narratives growing out of contemporary South Asian culture. Some of the works on display will include installation works by Anita Dube, activating text and the gaze that turns upon them as sites of resistance; portraits by Faiza Butt layered with multi-cultural, art historical and technological inspirations as seen from an autobiographical lens; photographs of protest by queer communities in London shot in the 1980s by Sunil Gupta; drawings by Jasmine Nilani Joseph elaborating on ideas of property, ancestry and displacement; poetic explorations of the human condition in one’s relationship to self, time and place in paintings by Zaam Arif; the complexity of intimacy in interpersonal relationships in a suite of recent drawings by Sudhir Patwardhan; and mixed media collage works by Shailesh B.R. that form a repository of observations, moods and imaginations through objects, elements and landscapes – among others