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Nataraj Sharma
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Born in 1958 in Mysore, Nataraj Sharma grew up in Egypt, England and Zambia. He studied Applied Art at the Faculty of Fine Arts at Maharaja Sayajirao University, Baroda, graduating in 1982.
Strongly influenced by socio-political happenings across the world and his own migrations, his art Sharma’s reflects a multiplicity of influences, not just in its content but also in its form. Sharma has dabbled with equal ease and success...
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Born in 1958 in Mysore, Nataraj Sharma grew up in Egypt, England and Zambia. He studied Applied Art at the Faculty of Fine Arts at Maharaja Sayajirao University, Baroda, graduating in 1982.
Strongly influenced by socio-political happenings across the world and his own migrations, his art Sharma’s reflects a multiplicity of influences, not just in its content but also in its form. Sharma has dabbled with equal ease and success in varied styles of painting, digital art and installations. Heavily influenced by pop art and its stalwart Andy Warhol, Dadaism and Marcel Duchamp, and the Indian Progressive artists, Sharma’s art visual vocabulary emerged as strongly individualized and strikingly bold.
Sharma moves swiftly and convincingly between figure studies, portraits and landscapes in oil and acrylic on canvas, and large scale installations. His recent works explore urban landscapes and industrial geometry, playing and teasing the forms that they take, stretching their boundaries, and depicting civilization through empty factories and battered machines.
Sharma solo exhibitions include 'Airshow' at Bodhi Art, Singapore in 2008-09; 'Work In Progress' at Bodhi Space, Mumbai, in 2008; ‘Stretch’ at the Singapore Tyler Print Institute and Bodhi Art, Singapore, Mumbai and New York, in 2007; ‘Flight’ at Art and Public, Geneva, and Bodhi Art, Mumbai, in 2007; and 'Nataraj Sharma: Vapi Horse and Other Stories' at Nature Morte, New Delhi in 2005. His work has been a part of several group shows including 'Living of the Grid' at Anant Art Centre, New Delhi, in 2009; 'Zip Files' at Tao Art Gallery, Mumbai, in 2009; 'Frame Figure Field: 20th Century Modern and Contemporary Indian Art' at Delhi Art Gallery, New Delhi, in 2008; ‘Edge of Desire’ which travelled to several cities across the world from 2005 unto 2007; and ‘Kitsch Kitsch Hota Hai’ presented by Gallery Espace at India Habitat Centre, New Delhi, in 2001.
Sharma was awarded the Sotheby’s Award for Best Emerging Artist in 1993, and participated in an artist residency program at the Singapore Tyler Print Institute (STPI), Singapore, in 2006.
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Born
1958
Mysore
Education
1982 Graduate in Applied Art, Faculty of Fine Arts, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda
Exhibitions
Selected Solo Exhibitions
2008-09 'Airshow', Bodhi Art,...
Selected Solo Exhibitions
2008-09 'Airshow', Bodhi Art, Singapore
2008 'Work In Progress', Bodhi Space, Mumbai
2007 ‘Stretch’, Traveling Exhibition at Singapore Tyler Print Institute, Singapore and Bodhi Art at Singapore, Mumbai and New York
2007 ‘Flight’, Art and Public, Geneva and Bodhi Art, Mumbai
2005 Bose Pacia, New York
2005 'Nataraj Sharma: Vapi Horse and Other Stories', Nature Morte, New Delhi
2000 ‘Recent Works’, Sakshi Gallery, Mumbai
2000 Nature Morte, New Delhi
Selected Group Exhibitions
2013 'Ideas of the Sublime', presented by Vadehra Art Gallery at Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi
2012 'Works on Paper- 2012', Gallery Espace, New Delhi
2011-12 'Back to School: Baroda 1979-89', Tao Art Gallery, Mumbai
2011 'Back to School: Baroda 1979-89', Palette Art Gallery, New Delhi
2010 'Looking Glass: The Existence of Difference', Twenty Indian Contemporary Artists presented by Religare Arts Initiative, New Delhi in collaboration with American Centre; British Council; Goethe-Institut/ Max Mueller Bhavan, New Delhi
2010 'Indian (Sub)Way', Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi; Grosvenor Vadehra, London
2009 'Living of the Grid', Anant Art Centre, New Delhi
2009 'Zip Files', Tao Art Gallery, Mumbai
2009 'Relative Visa', Bodhi Space, Mumbai
2008 'Frame Figure Field: 20th Century Modern and Contemporary Indian Art', Delhi Art Gallery, New Delhi
2008 ‘Frontline: Notations from the Contemporary Indian Urban’, Bodhiberlin, Berlin
2008 ‘India Crossing’, Studio La Citta, Verona
2007 ‘Edge of Desire’, National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA), Mumbai
2006 ‘Edge of Desire: Recent Art in India’, Berkeley Art Museum
2006 ‘Edge of Desire: Recent Art in India’, Montalvo Arts Center, Saratoga
2006 ‘Edge of Desire: Recent Art in India’, MARCO Monterrey
2006 ‘Indian Summer’, Ecole Nationale des Beaux Arts, Paris
2006 ‘Hungry God: Contemporary Art from India’, Aario, Beijing and Museum of Modern Art, Busan
2006 ‘El Filo del Deseo - Arte Reciente en India’, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Monterrey MARCO, Mexico
2005 ‘Edge of Desire: Recent Art in India’, Museo Tamayo, Mexico City
2005 ‘Edge of Desire: Recent Art in India’, Asia Society and Museum, New York
2005 ‘Edge of Desire: Recent Art in India’, Queens Museum of Art
2005 ‘Edge of Desire: Recent Art in India’, Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth
2005 ‘The Artist Lives and Works’, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin
2003 ‘Ways of Resistance’, Sahmat, Rabindra Bhavan, New Delhi and Mumbai
2001 ‘Kitsch Kitsch Hota Hai’, presented by Gallery Espace at India Habitat Centre, New Delhi
Participations
2014 'Ode to Monumental: Celebration, Visuality, Ideology', presented by Saffronart at Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi and Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai
2012 ‘To Let the World In: Narrative and Beyond in Contemporary Indian Art’, as part of Art Chennai, Edition II at Lalit Kala Regional Centre, Chennai
2011 'Homespun', Devi Art Foundation, New Delhi
2011 'The Intuitive: Logic Revisted', from the Osians Collection at The World Economic Forum, Davos, Switzerland
2009 Vancouver Biennale, Vancouver
2009 'Contemporary Exoticism', Studio La Citta, Verona
2009 'Indian Highway', Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo
2009 'Contemporary Indian Art: Open Your Third Eye', National Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul
2009 'ARCOmadrid', Spain presented by curator Bose Krishnamachari for 'Panoroma: India'
2008 'Chalo! India: A New Era of Indian Art', 5th Anniversary Exhibition, Mori Art Museum, Japan
2008 Represented by BodhiBerlin at Art Berlin Contemporary (ABC), Berlin
2005 ‘iCon: India Contemporary’, 51st Venice Biennale, Italy
Honours and Awards
2006 Residency at Singapore Tyler Print Institute (STPI), Singapore
1993 Sotheby’s Award for Best Emerging Artist
2006 Residency at Singapore Tyler Print Institute (STPI), Singapore
1993 Sotheby’s Award for Best Emerging Artist
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Q. What are your current concerns and what changes do you anticipate?
What I have been doing over the past three or four years is to narrow my subject matter to industrial landscape and the objects that one finds within that landscape. I've been able to stabilize direction, and to focus my work. Since my last show in February 1999 I have been attempting to paint a broader range of human experience. The things that...
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Q. What are your current concerns and what changes do you anticipate?
What I have been doing over the past three or four years is to narrow my subject matter to industrial landscape and the objects that one finds within that landscape. I've been able to stabilize direction, and to focus my work. Since my last show in February 1999 I have been attempting to paint a broader range of human experience. The things that I am touching upon and opening out to are humour and aspects of the singular, the autobiographical, the idiosyncratic. Art does not have to be just about suffering, oppression or violence; our lives can be lighter than that.
Q. The emphasis that you place on craft demands the use of certain tools or aids ; but you are also concerned that this should not become an easy device. Where would you pull yourself back?
There are devices all around us and it is a very strange thing that as artists we struggle to reach a point and when we have reached it, the formula or the device can take over. Sometimes when I look at artists' work I like to see the struggle that's going on rather than the accomplishment and the kind of Cheshire Cat grinning that comes with accomplished work. I'd much rather savour the human struggle that goes on before that accomplishment was achieved. Technical devices can fill a painting with short cuts and easy access to striking images; and it's very risky, very dangerous.
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Lot 23
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Contemporary South Asian Art
21-22 October 2024
Untitled...
Serigraph, enamel and acrylic on paper laid on board
32 x 68 in
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Lot 130
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Summer Online Auction
26-27 June 2024
Health is Wealth
Oil and acrylic on canvas pasted on board
30.25 x 66 in
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Rs 18,00,000
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Lot 198
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Winter Online Auction
13-14 December 2023
Kannuru Storm
Oil on canvas
72 x 108 in
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$40,482
Rs 33,60,000
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