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Indian Express: Frieze Frame: Indian galleries with rich palette of senior, emerging artists’ work in London

Posted On: Sunday, October 16th, 2022 | by project88pressadmin

Mulji’s works are part of Mumbai-based gallery Project 88’s group show at this year’s Frieze

by Trisha Mukherjee

A seemingly abandoned chair sits outside a house. The wall behind is covered with bougainvillaea creepers, its pink and white flowers lay strewn across the floor. A stand fan and a water bottle cap with an upturned steel glass on either side of the chair indicate ‘someone was here’.

Khayaban-e-Sehr

Named ‘Khayaban-e-Sehr’ after a locality in Karachi, this small-scale oil painting (11.5×11 inches) by Pakistani artist Huma Mulji packs a medley of emotions in its bold strokes of spring hues––greens, yellows, and pinks contrasting with earthy shades of browns and greys. A melancholic absence is palpable.

“I am looking beyond the human lens at a city that is usually so populated.  I visited Karachi during the pandemic, and suddenly these chairs, which were used by guards to sit outside people’s houses, were vacated. It’s about things that are left behind because of a sudden occurrence. The image is speculative,” says the artist, who has been living in England for the past seven years.

Mulji’s works are part of Mumbai-based gallery Project 88’s group show at this year’s Frieze, London (October 12-16). Other artists in the show include Amitesh Shrivastava, Amol Patil and Mahesh Baliga.

“Our booth emerges from a singular probe––the relation between a corporeal body and its subtracted traces or material absences, which become portals to a new way of seeing, thinking and perceiving art in contemporary time,” says Sree Goswami of Project 88.

 

Read the entire article here: https://www.indulgexpress.com/culture/art/2022/oct/16/frieze-frame-indian-galleries-with-rich-palette-of-senior-emerging-artists-work-in-london-44710.html