Asia Arts Game Changer Awards: Recognising innovation in contemporary art

In 2021, at the DAG show Ways of Seeing, viewers came across a work by Anupam Sud that was emblematic of her practice. In Draupadi’s Vow (2006), the artist—who lives and works in Mandi, on the outskirts of Delhi—delved into the epic of Mahabharat to create a work that was both contemporary in approach and theme. The work presented a contrast—Draupadi, with her flowing untied hair, completely in control, while her five husbands look on with a defeated stance. Like in most of Sud’s work, the female protagonist in Draupadi’s Vow too takes charge of her body and sexuality, defying the rules set by patriarchy. For nearly six decades now, the artist has explored the human form and its under lying vulnerability and resilience—be it in her early etchings or recent experi mental print collages. As one of the founder members of Group 8, she has also worked relentlessly to sustain print making as an independent form.

As Sud moves towards a different phase of her career, galleries are celebrating her powerful language through solos and themed shows. For instance, Palette Art Gallery, Delhi, is hosting The Journey a Full Circle, featuring over 60 pieces from her early to recent years. In his curatorial note for this show, Kishore Singh, vice president, DAG, has called Sud a chronicler of stories, someone who holds up a mirror to our naked, reflected selves. “Bogged down by its exertions, she has decided to take a leave of (perhaps permanent) absence from the very medium [printmaking] that has defined her career, though she has also painted simultane ously, as also increasingly in recent years,” he writes. “That way too lies the future, amidst graphite and paint, paper and can vas, almost certainly beckoning her with a fresh cast of characters.”

This landmark moment in Sud’s practice is also being recognised at the ninth edition of the Asia Arts Game Changer Awards to be held at the India Art Fair on 7 February. Organised by the Asia Society India, an arm of the not-for-profit organisation established by John D. Rockefeller III, the awards acknowledge innovation and excellence in contemporary art practices from India and South Asia through four categories: the Asia Arts Vanguard Award, the Asia Arts Pathbreaker Award, and the Asia Arts Future Awards (India and South Asia). These are co-chaired by art patrons Sangita Jindal, Kiran Nadar, Pheroza Godrej and Radhika Chopra.

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Sud is being presented with the Vanguard award, which recognises senior visual artists, who have pioneered contemporary art and have been educators and mentors to younger practitioners. In the past, this award has been presented to Krishen Khanna, Arpita Singh, Gulammohammed Sheikh, Vivan Sundaram, and others. According to Inakshi Sobti, CEO, Asia Society India Centre, Sud’s practice has been consistently unusual, expressive and impactful.“Her usage of printmaking as a medium to chart out the feminine experience from the confines of the domestic and interior spaces of one’s life has been bold and inspiring. We see her influence in several of her contemporaries and students, and we see how printmaking has taken on as a serious practice in itself in the practice of younger contemporary artists like Jayeeta Chatterjee who bring their own individuality to the technique and to art in general,” she elaborates.

Interestingly Chatterjee too is being recognised at the event with the Asia Arts Future Award for her unique language, which combines printmaking with textile and embroidery. The Bengaluru-based artist has been connecting the interior worlds of women with the daily chores that they perform in domestic spaces, which are often ignored by society. Wherever she travels, Chatterjee engages in conversations with women there, delving into their past and present. She tells their stories by incorporating fragments of the women’s saris and cloth in her woodblock prints. She also employs the ancient technique of the nakshi kantha, practiced in rural Bengal, adding another layer to the overall narrative.

Also featured in this edition of the awards is Shilpa Gupta as the pathbreaker—a recognition of the next generation of vanguards in the making, who have experimented with standard convention of medium and discipline. According to Sobti, the artist has consistently broken new ground, and has reached out to a global audience through a message of what it means to stand in solidarity with people on the margins. “She provokes us to consciously care about the world at a time when it is overwhelming to do so,” she adds.

Gupta’s practice is also the focus of two ongoing major exhibitions organised by the Ishara Art Foundation, Dubai, and Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi. The former, titled Lines of Light—the artist’s first solo in West Asia—features a selection of works from 2006 to the present, including a new sound installation, site-specific interventions, sculptures, drawings, and more. The works look at Gupta’s unique approach—poetics of resistance, if you will—to approach the idea of borders, both seen and unseen. The eponymous show, organised by Vadehra Art Gallery at the Bikaner House, features up to 20 works, including motion flap boards, kinetic and static sculptures, a sound installation and more.

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A fourth category—Asia Arts Future Award (South Asia)—focuses on an emerging artist from the subcontinent, who articulates a lived experience of the region to South Asian audiences and beyond. While the previous editions focused on Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bangladesh, this year, the focus is on Pakistan. The award, under the guidance of guest advisors Nada Raza and Zarmeene Shah, is being presented to Karachi LaJamia, founded in 2015 by artists  Shahana Rajani and Zahra Malkani “as a nomadic space moving outside the institution to explore new radical pedagogies and art practices”. “Their focus on pedagogy as practice, the versatility of their use of public spaces as art projects, and their ability to use political critique as public engagement makes them unique. They exist outside the institution and its narratives; their work is a testament to how contemporary art practices are defining a new South Asia,” signs off Sobti.