Art exhibition display modern and contemporary art of South Asia through the lens of popular culture

Weaving an intergenerational dialogue through more than 100 artworks by artists from different parts of the world, new exhibition “Pop South Asia: Artistic Explorations” provides a substantial representation of modern and contemporary art from South Asia inflected through the vibrant prism of popular culture. The three-month-long exhibition, which opened here on Wednesday at Kiran Nadar Museum of Art (KNMA), was first initiated and displayed at the Sharjah Art Foundation in September last year. (Also read: Kashmiri artist’s abstract art showcased at international exhibitions )

It is curated by lftikhar Dadi, artist and John H. Burris Professor at Cornell University, and Roobina Karode, director and chief curator of the KNMA. Spanning works mainly from the mid-20th century to the present, the exhibition showcases artists addressing complex issues facing the self and society and the politics of the everyday through irony, play and humour.

“Conceptually a pioneering initiative, the exhibition presents intergenerational artists from Afghanistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka highlighting the diversity of the word pop itself and intersections with folk, vernacular and urban street cultures, that expands the meaning of the term beyond the historical Movement in the West,” said Karode in a statement. Works by around 50 artists from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and the diaspora are featured in the exhibition.

Indian artist Atul Dodiya’s painting ‘Gabbar on Gamboge’ (1997), a homage to Bollywood cinema’s iconic villain from the 1975 blockbuster “Sholay”, and New York-based artist Baseera Khan’s lantern-like ‘Chandelier’ (2021) sculptures, referencing the joyous and cross-cultural associations evoked by disco balls, are among the many highlights of the exhibition.

Alluding to the fluid spirit and shifting definition of the Pop, the exhibition, according to the organisers, “does not intend to be a complete account, but presents many parallel and intersecting routes coalescing from different vantage points”.

The late seminal Indian painter Bhupen Khakhar’s ‘Janata Watch Repairing’ (1972) and ‘De-Luxe Tailors’ (1972), reminiscent of the ethos of shops and businesses across small towns in South Asia, as well as Afghan-Canadian artist Hangama Amiri’s textile installation ‘Nail Salon’ (2020), in which the artist wove her childhood memories of Kabul’s storefronts of beauty parlours and nail salons, are other significant highlights showcased in the exhibition.

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