In-Rhythm & Inheritors of Earth

'The Kiran Nadar Museum of Art (KNMA) announces two exhibitions opening on 9th September 2026 at KNMA, New Delhi, bringing together distinct artistic practices that invite audiences to reconsider how we relate to the world around us. Presented in partnership with Italian Embassy Cultural Centre in New Delhi, and Archivio Bice Lazzari, In-Rhythm, BICE LAZZARI and NASREEN MOHAMEDI, will be curated by Andrea Anastasio, Director, the Italian Cultural Institute in New Delhi and Roobina Karode, Artistic Director and Chief Curator, KNMA, assisted by Neha 'Zooni' Tickoo, Curator, KNMA. Bringing together the works of Italian artist Bice Lazzari (1900-1981) and Indian artist Nasreen Mohamedi (1937-1990) the exhibition explores their shared engagement with line, repetition, geometry and restraint.

Moving away from minimalistic expressions of human emotions, Inheritors of Earth, curated by Premjish Achari, Senior Curator, KNMA, explores plant life as protagonists in a shared world: presenting them as agents beyond human perspectives of function, aesthetics, or ecological concern. Together, the exhibitions offer two very distinct but complementary ways of looking - while Inheritors of Earth invites us to consider the world through a vegetal lens, In-Rhythm asks us to slow down and attend closely to the quiet, precise gestures of a line.

Curated by Andrea Anastasio, Director, the Italian Cultural Institute in New Delhi and Roobina Karode, Artistic Director and Chief Curator, KNMA, assisted by Neha 'Zooni' Tickoo, Curator, KNMA, In-Rhythm, brings together the works of Italian painter Bice Lazzari and Indian artist Nasreen Mohamedi, two artists who never met and, as far as records indicate, never encountered each other’s work.

Yet across the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s, both developed remarkably similar approaches to line, repetition, geometry and restraint. The exhibition does not suggest influence. Instead, it explores an unexpected artistic kinship: the way both artists used limitation not as a restriction, but as a means of creating clarity, rhythm and emotion. Lazzari gradually moved from the material richness of her earlier work towards lines, grids and subtle fields of colour. Mohamedi similarly moved away from figuration and colour towards an increasingly precise language of pencil, ink and geometric abstraction. For both artists, the grid became more than a structure. It became a way of thinking and feeling. Small variations in line, spacing and rhythm prevent their works from becoming purely mathematical, allowing repetition to become lyrical.

The exhibition also considers the relationship between artistic discipline and the body. Both artists developed their mature practices under changing physical circumstances, yet their work resists being understood through biography alone. Instead, their precision can be seen as an expression of concentration, continuity and will. The exhibition culminates in a direct visual dialogue between works by the two artists, bringing together practices that evolved independently and were recognised internationally largely after their deaths. In-Rhythm ultimately asks a simple but profound question: How much feeling can a single line carry?

Echoing Vaikom Muhammad Basheer’s Bhumiyude Avakashikal (1977), which imagines humans, flora and fauna as equal co-custodians of the planet, Inheritors of Earth considers plant life not as a passive backdrop to human experience, but as a parallel, entangled world with its own rhythms, histories and forms of resilience. It opens possibilities for unlearning the transactional ways in which we usually approach plants, encouraging us instead to dwell with their worlds, observe their temporalities and allow their rhythms to enter the texture of artistic practice.

Bringing together paintings, photographs, drawings, videos and installations, the exhibition traces themes of growth and decay, rootedness and migration, memory and ecological change. The artists move beyond simply representing plants to develop what the exhibition describes as a phytosensitive approach, one that brings a patient and meditative sensibility to looking, attending to plant temporalities, displaced organic matter and the histories carried through botanical migrations. Together, these practices invite us to look with plants rather than merely at them, reconfiguring our imagination towards coexistence, humility and a renewed sense of shared inheritance.

Presented together the two exhibitions offer markedly different encounters with artistic practice. Inheritors of Earth expands the field of attention beyond the human, considering plants as active participants in histories of ecology, migration, memory and belonging. In-Rhythm turns attention inward, towards the discipline of looking, the emotional potential of abstraction and the quiet force of repetition. Together, they invite audiences to slow down, reconsider familiar ways of seeing and remain attentive to forms of life, thought and experience that can easily escape notice.' 

Words Platform Desk
Date 8.9.2026