Two Indian expatriates in New York art show
Five artists of different vision, genre and origin, including two of Indian descent have come together for a show in NY.
Five artists of different vision, genre and origin, including two of Indian descent, have come together from different parts of the world for a show here.
Of the five - Natvar Bhavsar, Stan Gregory, Nathan Slate Joseph, Michael Petry and Sohan Qadri - four are expatriates. Their works are being displayed at the Sundaram Tagore Gallery in Manhattan.
Bhavsar, a native of Gujarat, and Joseph, who was born in Israel, are New Yorkers. Qadri, whose roots are in Punjab, lives in Copenhagen.
Texas-born Petry, confronted at the age of 21 with the prospect of graduate studies at Harvard and a year's hiatus in Britain, chose the latter.
The fifth artist, Gregory, has stayed rooted in his native Florida.
They are diverse in their choice of visual genres. Joseph creates abstract forms with galvanised steel while Petry is an author and installation artist.
Gregory's work resonates with lines reminiscent of the Renaissance, Islamic and Japanese calligraphic traditions. Qadri works on paper, which he wrinkles with ridges, soaks with bright dyes, and scars with holes.
And like god sparking life from high on a supine and lifeless Adam in Michelangelo's painting, Bhavsar hovers above his huge canvases, sprinkling powdered granules of colour to create nebulas and galaxies without borders.
What is the thread running through all five at their show at the gallery in SoHo in Manhattan that runs till July 24?
Like planes that carry passengers to the realm of clouds, the five artists conduct viewers to regions up high, far beyond their everyday worlds.