Lalit Kala Akademi brings the best of Indian Contemporary Art to Delhi

The intoxication of colors is yet to subside, the exaltation of love and expression is yet to pass, with Holi and it’s time again to paint our soul with colors of the art of 168 artists at the Lalit Kala Akademi’s 55th edition of National Exhibition of Art.

Theodore Dreiser said, “Art is the stored honey of the human soul, gathered on wings of misery and travail.” While our life runs aground in the grooves of cement, bricks, stone and steel, Lalit Kala Akademi (India’s premier Art Institution), after a gap of 20 years, brings the 55th National Exhibition of Art back to Delhi, to let it revel in the colours, tones and hues of human yearnings.

Oil, Acrylic, Canvas, Stone, Bronze, Charcoal, Etchings, Ceramic artwork are on display at the National Exhibition of Art. After a double screening by eminent Juries, artists from the entire country will display their work at the National Art Exhibition in Delhi from 20th March to 10th April, 2014 at the, Rabindra Bhawan Gallery (Mandi House). Works of 9 invited artists and four films will also form part of this exhibition.

The National award carries Prize Money of Rs 1 Lakh, a Plaque and a Certificate each. (The list of awardees is attached.)  The Akademi congratulated those chosen by the Jury and wished that they too, like earlier awardees including MF Hussain, NS Bendre, Gulam Mohammed Sheikh and many others will bring name to the country and add lustre to the Academy.

Dr K. K Chakravarty, Chairperson, Lalit Kala Akademi says “The 55th National Exhibition of Art looks at the world made by human beings in the eye and creates a spectrally heightened and distorted actuality, autonomous self-evolving structures, in tune with the transformative, leavening power of nature. The exhibition lends extraordinary meaning to ordinary objects by associating them in unforeseen permutations and combinations, in simultaneity and fusion.”

“It builds bridges between the corporeal and incorporeal, figurative and non-figurative, to express the inexpressible, and to communicate a sense of urgency for diagnosing and curing the radically fractured human condition. It reminds us that ‘hidden worlds connect to the things that hide them; within the red wood bark lies moss, under which are toads and insects: Tide pools connect us with unfathomable seas, which connect with our chromosomes’.

The works were chosen by a Screening Committee consisting of eminent personalities including, Mr Sachida Nagdev, Dr. Asharfi S. Bhagat, Mr Ajit Kumar Dubey, Mr Satish Sharma, Mr Aditya Arya , Mr H A Anil Kumar. A second-tier Jury for choosing the ten National Awardees from this selection has been done by another eminent jury comprising of Mr V Ramesh, Mr Ajay Kumar, Mr Deepak Kanal, Mr Deepak Banerjee, Mrs Shobha Broota, Mr S. Paul, Mr Suresh Jayaram and Mr Shrenik Jain.

Mr Ramakrishna Vedala, Secretary, Lalit Kala Akademi elucidates the methodology involved in choosing the works for the National Exhibition of Art “The works in the current exhibition merit attention on account of their challenging content, epitomizing creative features, individual commitment, discriminating quality of methods, materials used and more, so that the exhibition becomes a true representation of the dimensions of contemporary art thinking nationally.”