Jan 06 2024 to Jan 14 2024 11 a.m.

EVENT HAS ENDED

Where

Gallery Time and Space

The Guild, 2nd Floor # 55, Lavelle Road, Bangalore - 560 001

Event Description

Sanjiv Sankkpal’s art trajectory has taken him on a journey of self-discovery and expression, from the villages of Maharashtra in India to the heartlands of North America, Europe and East Asia. His art evolved from recreating scenes of everyday life in rural India to delving deeper into the human condition, exploring mind and anatomy, and seeking out its truest forms. A symbolic study of a nude model in Kelowna (Canada) with a group of artists in 2007 fuelled this transformation. It was a curve in the road, both literally and figuratively, and one that Sanjiv tread with renewed vigour, his senses awakened to an elevated state of being.

His path was further forged with a visit in 2011 to the Henri Moore Foundation at Perry Green, UK, where iconic sculptures like ‘Reclining Figure’ and ‘King and Queen’ fired his imagination. A subsequent visit in 2016 allowed him to study Matisse’s Fauvism, Rodin’s sculptures, and the tortured yet sublime works of Van Gogh. A visit to the Bhusan International Art Fair in 2019 further widened the horizons of his already heightened creativity.

Then came 2020. A year of solitude and introspection. A front row seat to the calamities of the human condition. Frazzled figures began to appear on his canvases. This time, he chose to leave them bare. Uncloaked and unhindered. Sorrowful, pensive, agitated, restful, distraught, fatigued, amazed, and sometimes joyful. For it is the unconscious endeavour of the human spirit to seek out momentary comforts of joy, even in tragedy. The result was an oeuvre that struck a chord far deeper than human anatomy.

There is power in gestures. It facilitates our desire to communicate. To connect. Seeded deep within us, is a primal need to belong in the natural world. To be a synchronous part of it. Why else would we walk barefoot on grass, or sink into wet sands that meet the sea?

Be it subtly sensuous, or decidedly erotic, Sanjiv’s figures reflect this connection. A heightened state of being. What it means to be truly comfortable in our skin. This question is especially relevant in an era of endless stimulation. He strips us down to basics. To find our place once again through the universal language of anatomy and gesture - a timeless force binding not only humans, but every living being on this planet.

As we step closer to his art, a figure whispers, “Look beyond the curves.”