Timeless Visions: Contemporary Art of India


	Timeless Visions: Contemporary Art of India from the Chester and Davida Herwitz Collection The exhibition Timeless Visions celebrates the modern and contemporary work of thirteen artists from India. As a group, these artists have probed such profound themes as the nature of creation and representations of the divine, the essence of being human, the character of the heroic, and such formal concerns as the significance of color, form and space. As a country, India which gained independence from British rule in 1947 ranks second after China in terms of population and is home to the world's largest film industry. While collections of the traditional arts of India such as Hindu and Buddhist temple sculpture and Indian miniatures are well established in museums throughout the world, the importance of the art of post-colonial India has only recently begun to be recognized. Contemporary Indian art represents a radical break from the past because Indian artists are no longer subordinate to patrons or trained solely as apprentices in established styles. Color, form, texture and line once deployed only for narrative purposes have become the focus of their art, sometimes taking precedence - or becoming - its content. As members of the Progressive Artists Group, S.H. Raza and Maqbool Fida Husain were instrumental in internationalizing Indian art by acknowledging a debt to Western Modernism and incorporating their Indian artistic heritage into their work. By including references to Hinduism, the epic Ramayana, and the many deities worshipped within their society, the artists in this exhibition, such as K.G. Ramanujam and Bikash Bhattacharjee, have drawn from Indiaís rich history. While cognizant of Western artistic traditions, contemporary Indian artists are exploring a wide range of subjects and themes from a uniquely Indian perspective. In describing his work, M. F. Husain has said "... for the last 40 years, I have depicted in my work nothing but India herself." The collectors, Davida and the late Chester Herwitz, have been acquiring Indian art since the 1960s. The couple was captivated by the country in 1961 while visiting suppliers for their women's fashion accessories business in Worchester, Massachusetts. Their collection, from which this exhibition is drawn, numbers more than three thousand works. As the largest and most comprehensive collection of modern Indian art, the Herwitz Collection traces the development of many of India's established and emerging artists. Works from the collection have been exhibited at the Tate Gallery, the Museum of Modern Art in Oxford, the Centre Pompidou, the Chicago Institute of Art and the Worcester Art Museum. This exhibition, organized by the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, is dedicated to the memory of Chester Herwitz who was honored in 1997 with the Indo-American Society award for his contribution to the development of Indian art. © 2000 Marquette University

Timeless Visions: Contemporary Art of India
from the Chester and Davida Herwitz Collection

The exhibition Timeless Visions celebrates the modern and contemporary work of thirteen artists from India. As a group, these artists have probed such profound themes as the nature of creation and representations of the divine, the essence of being human, the character of the heroic, and such formal concerns as the significance of color, form and space.

As a country, India which gained independence from British rule in 1947 ranks second after China in terms of population and is home to the world's largest film industry. While collections of the traditional arts of India such as Hindu and Buddhist temple sculpture and Indian miniatures are well established in museums throughout the world, the importance of the art of post-colonial India has only recently begun to be recognized. Contemporary Indian art represents a radical break from the past because Indian artists are no longer subordinate to patrons or trained solely as apprentices in established styles. Color, form, texture and line once deployed only for narrative purposes have become the focus of their art, sometimes taking precedence - or becoming - its content.

As members of the Progressive Artists Group, S.H. Raza and Maqbool Fida Husain were instrumental in internationalizing Indian art by acknowledging a debt to Western Modernism and incorporating their Indian artistic heritage into their work.

By including references to Hinduism, the epic Ramayana, and the many deities worshipped within their society, the artists in this exhibition, such as K.G. Ramanujam and Bikash Bhattacharjee, have drawn from Indiaís rich history. While cognizant of Western artistic traditions, contemporary Indian artists are exploring a wide range of subjects and themes from a uniquely Indian perspective. In describing his work, M. F. Husain has said "... for the last 40 years, I have depicted in my work nothing but India herself."

The collectors, Davida and the late Chester Herwitz, have been acquiring Indian art since the 1960s. The couple was captivated by the country in 1961 while visiting suppliers for their women's fashion accessories business in Worchester, Massachusetts. Their collection, from which this exhibition is drawn, numbers more than three thousand works. As the largest and most comprehensive collection of modern Indian art, the Herwitz Collection traces the development of many of India's established and emerging artists. Works from the collection have been exhibited at the Tate Gallery, the Museum of Modern Art in Oxford, the Centre Pompidou, the Chicago Institute of Art and the Worcester Art Museum.

This exhibition, organized by the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, is dedicated to the memory of Chester Herwitz who was honored in 1997 with the Indo-American Society award for his contribution to the development of Indian art.