Artists
India
Shaurya Kumar
Visiting Artist
19.11.16 27.11.16
A native of Delhi, India where he studied printmaking and painting at the College of Art; Shaurya Kumar graduated with his MFA from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 2007.
Since 2001, Kumar has been involved in numerous prestigious research projects, like “The Paintings of India” (a series of 26 documentary films on the painting tradition of India); “Handmade in India” (an encyclopedia on the handicraft traditions of India); and digital restorations of 6th century Buddhist mural paintings from the caves of Ajanta.
Kumar’s work has exhibited widely across the USA and India, as well as inTaiwan, China, Poland, South Korea, Thailand, Belgium, Bulgaria, Italy, U.K., Norway, France, Australia and Finland among many others. His works have been installed at venues including the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum (formerly Victoria & Albert Museum, Mumbai); Gallery Odyssey, Mumbai; Sundaram Tagore gallery, NYC; Queens Museum, NYC; Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul; Lakeeren Gallery, Mumbai; Artifact Gallery, NYC; LACDA, Los Angeles, CA; Museum of Fine Arts, Georgia; Schneider Museum of Art, Oregon; Charleston Heights Art Center, Las Vegas; TamTam Gallery, Taiwan; Guanlan Printmaking Base, China; UNM Art Museum, Albuquerque; SCA Contemporary, Albuquerque; NIU Art Museum, Illinois and Kriti Gallery, Varanasi among many others. Kumar’s work has also featured in international art fairs including India Art Fair, Dubai Art Fair and Poznan Art Week.
Shaurya Kumar currently lives and works in Chicago, IL. He is an Associate Professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Chair of the Department of Printmedia which consists of more than fifteen faculty, twenty graduate students and serves over 750 undergrad students each year.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Much of my work, thought and research in recent projects has been a response to the contemporary state of ruinous affairs. Reflecting on loss, destruction, iconoclasm and marginalization my work addresses how our understanding of history, culture and religion is constantly reinterpreted and distorted.
Employing diverse sets of tools, media, techniques and processes including print, drawing, sculpture and installation, my oeuvre focuses on a phenomenological understanding of object and space, while revealing a labor-intensive process in my art making. Indicating notions of presence and absence, these works play with architectural ruins, transient ephemera, and contextual displacements.
BIO
Shaurya Kumar
1979 | New Delhi, India
Lives and works in Chicago, USA
EDUCATION
2007 | MFA in Studio Art from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, USA
BFA in Printmaking and Painting at the College of Art, Delhi, India
EXHIBITIONS
Gallery Odyssey. Mumbai, India
Lakeeren Gallery. Mumbai, India
Dr. BDL Museum. Mumbai, India
TamTam Gallery. Taipei, Taiwan
SCA Contemporary. Albuquerque, USA
Art Dubai, U.A.E.
Seoul Museum. Seoul, Korea
Guanlan Print Base. Shenzhen, China
Queens Museum. New York, USA
Artifact. New York, USA
AWARDS AND RESIDENCIES
Guanlan Printmaking Base. Shenzhen, China
Xian Academy of Fine Arts. China
Frans Masereel Centrum, Belgium
Bharat Bhavan, India
Markem-Imaje International Award
Faculty of the Year, SAIC, USA
Individual Artists Grant, City of Chicago, USA
Numerous faculty research grants, USA
Related Activities
Exhibitions
Cast in Ruins
Shaurya Kumar
23.11.16 23.12.16
As a visiting artist, Indian artist Shaurya Kumar developed a series of activities at ´ace which included an exhibition of his recent pieces and encounters with emerging Argentinean artists.
Kumar’s research is focused on creating works which appreciate and appropriate new media while highlighting the dangers of its longevity; and the disconnect between the virtual and the real. His work is an investigation of art and technology, and the rift that lies between. Ultimately, his work is a dialogue about site, how site effects and affects data and therefore a society, a culture, a people and ultimately a person.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Much of my work, thought and research in recent projects has been a response to the contemporary state of ruinous affairs. Reflecting on loss, destruction, iconoclasism and marginalization my work addresses how our understanding of history, culture and religion is constantly reinterpreted and distorted.
Employing diverse sets of tools, media, techniques and processes including print, drawing, sculpture and installation, my oeuvre focuses on a phenomenological understanding of object and space, while revealing a labor-intensive process in my art making. Indicating notions of presence and absence, these works play with architectural ruins, transient ephemera, and contextual displacements.
Synced to the vicissitudes of time and organic growth, drawing inspiration from classical texts and poetry to new media and ethnographic studies, my work addresses the loss of aura when the original is transformed in its meaning and narrative due to transposition, marginalization and destruction. It addresses the new world of non-objects and questions the role of individuals and institutions that assign them their new meaning.
Related artists
Since 2001, Kumar has been involved in numerous prestigious research projects, like The Paintings of India (a series of 26 documentary films on the painting tradition of India), Handmade in India (an encyclopedia on the handicraft traditions of India) and digital restorations of 6th century Buddhist mural paintings from the caves of Ajanta.
