Last year Southwark Park Galleries was awarded funding from the Art Fund’s Weston Loan Programme to support a Research & Development project with London-based artist and musician Paul Purgas. Growing from his 2024 commission In the Temple of the Earth at Dilston Gallery, I had the opportunity to assist Paul in his ongoing research into South Asian modernism, India’s vibrant art history and its unique intertwining of mysticism. 

Drawing together artists working throughout the 21st century, this has been an essential opportunity to investigate South Asian art history, independent of the western-centric study of modernism, and scope out a future exhibition proposal. Part of the research involved tracing Indian Modernist solo and group exhibitions throughout the UK, with 2024 being a seemingly pivotal year for the British art world’s recognition of this rich legacy, including: The Imaginary Institution of India Art 1975–1998 at the Barbican, London; South Asian Modernists 1953-63 at The Whitworth, Manchester; and Painting Freedom: Indian Modernism and its Three Rebels at Leicester Museum & Art Gallery. 

As a dynamic aspect of this research and development, we were able to make a number of site visits. In Autumn we visited Alchemies at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, a solo exhibition by painter, sculptor and installation artist Bharti Kher (b. 1969). It was a rare and captivating opportunity to see so many multifaceted works together; mythological figures and large materialist sculptures created a sense of a transported otherworldly place, especially within the powerful landscape and site of YSP. 

We also made a trip to The British Museum’s Department of Asia Study Room to see a number of undisplayed collection works, including a range of 1970’s neo-tantric paintings by G. R. Santosh (1929–97) and Dreamings and Defilings, a beautiful accordion sketchbook by multidisciplinary artist Nalini Malani (b. 1946). A special highlight was seeing these next to, and drawing from, traditional tantric art, such as a 19th century Bengal School of Art style cotton Kali Yantra painting — a sacred geometric diagram representing the Hindu goddess Kali — by an unknown artist.

Another part of the research was collating information with Paul to develop a selected database of South Asian artists’ work, focusing on around 16 UK public collections including pieces by renowned textile sculptor Mrinalini Mukherjee (1949–2015), Turner Prize 2024 winner Jasleen Kaur (b. 1986) and pioneering polymath Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941). In building this database, we were delighted to find that so many South Asian artists are now being represented through institutional collections as both an influence on and a verified part of British art history. There will hopefully be more opportunities in the future to see works by these artists, some of which have so far been stored away or thought to primarily exist in India. 

The whole project has fed into a long-term goal of the galleries which is to work more with national collections. In conjunction with this, I was supported to complete ‘Preparing to Borrow’ training with The Exhibitions Group to better understand the requirements and processes needed for loan-based exhibitions and related collections care. 

This project has been a personally meaningful discovery for me, as like many British and diasporic South Asians, my family believe they are not included in the modern art history canon due, in part, to a lack of visibility in exhibitions, publications and collection displays. Over the course of the year, this research project has led to rich and multifaceted conversations, reflection and conceptual evolutions. I have been able to enrich my own knowledge as well as Paul’s, whose research in this crucial area of history remains ongoing. 

Thank you to the Art Fund’s Weston Loan Programme for allowing us to explore the scope and possibilities of this project. Their support and recognition of the hard work that goes on in the development stages of exhibition-making, is so vital to realising worthwhile and well researched programmes. 

 

— Marjian Tsatsaros Tyagi, Research Assistant

Launch Gallery