India Art Festival announces its first edition in Bengaluru!

The popular art fair, India Art Festival, will be organized in Bengaluru for the first time featuring 25 art galleries and more than 100 master and independent artists.

The India Art Festival is all set to welcome the people of Bengaluru for the first time between May 5 to May 8, 2022. A contemporary art fair hosted annually in New Delhi and Mumbai since 2011 is presenting its debut edition in association with Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath at Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath Art Complex, Kumara Krupa Road.

Since 2011, the twenty editions of the India Art Festival have been a popular art fair wherein art galleries as well as independent artists are invited to exhibit under one roof. The Festival has been a pioneer in providing artists with an opportunity to expose their art to several different kinds of audiences and build their network.

On the other hand, the team of India Art Festival has observed that the art buyers and art collectors prefer annual art fairs to search for works of art they like from thousands of quality artworks available under one roof. In their words, "It also allows non-participating artists to interact with those who are displaying their works."

As the Director of the festival, Rajendra, says, "Thousands of new artists come out of art schools in the country every year, but they seldom get art galleries to represent them immediately. Today’s millennials look for ‘artworks’ that they can acquire to create an inspiring ambience around their living spaces, many major and mid-level art galleries also look for art fairs in the metro-cities to reach out to the wider art buyer base. Today’s art buyers also look for a ‘one-stop art shop’ with thousands of art choices under one roof. India Art Festival fulfils the needs of both artists and art buyers.”

The Bengaluru edition

After the huge success of IAF in Mumbai and Delhi, it was likely for the festival to spread its roots, and as Rajendra says, it was a collective decision to choose Bengaluru for the new edition. "As we conducted a small survey, we figured out that Bengaluru had even more art galleries than Kolkata," he says on choosing Bengaluru over Kolkata, which is popular as the "cultural capital" of India.

The art show in Bengaluru will be open to the public from May 6 to May 8, 2022, between 11.00 am to 8.00 pm daily. The edition comes with a mission, 'democratising art viewing and buying' and offers free entry to the visitors. As per the reports, around 25 art galleries will be showcasing 100 master artists' artworks along with 300 mid-career and emerging artists, showcasing 3000 works of art displayed through 80 booths.

The master artists whose museum-quality works will be displayed include Jogen Chowdhury, Jatin Das, Krishen Khanna, Lalu Prasad Shaw, S G Vasudev, Manu Parekh, Neeraj Goswami, Jayshree Burman, Sudhir Patwardhan, Jatin Das, Sakti Burman, Laxma Goud, Seema Kohli, Ashok Bhowmick, Vasudev SG, Yusuf Arakkal, Paresh Maity, T Vaikuntam, P Gnana, Laxman Aelay, Niladri Paul, Gurudas Shenoy, Ramesh Gorjala, M Narayan, HR Das, and 100 other established names.

Not only this, but the veteran art gallery from Bengaluru Galerie Sara Arakkal will be showcasing master as well as young artists which include works of master painter Yusuf Arakkal, C.F. John, Azis.T.M, Venugopal EK, Chandranath Acharya, Gita Hudson, Praveen Kumar, Rani Rekha and others. The other two galleries from Bengaluru – Charvi Art Gallery and H Art Gallery are also exhibiting master artists that include P Suresh, G Subramanian, Suhas Roy, Sunil Das, Laxman Aelay, Devraj Dakoji, S A Vimalanathan, Anilakumar Govindappa and others.

Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath will also be showcasing the works of a few senior artists like Prof M J kamalakshi, V R Chandrashaka, A Ramakrishnappa, B Y Vinoda, Rama Sharma, and Tharakeshwari T V apart from their master collection. Mumbai-based Studio3 gallery will be presenting an assortment of landscapes, religious and spiritual art, and portraiture in figurative and semi abstractions by Bharti-Prajapati, Gurudas Shenoy, JMS Mani, Vinita-Karim, and others.

The regulars at IAF like Gallerie Splash and Easel Stories from New Delhi and Noida respectively will be participating for the first time in a different city. While Gallerie Splash will be presenting the artworks of Manu Parekh, Ashok Bhowmick, Lalu Prasad Shaw, Gurmeeet Marwah, Lalbahadur Singh, Nagesh Ghodke, and Roy K John, Easel Stories will be showcasing the artworks by senior artists A. Viswam, Arpan Bhowmik, Bikash Poddar, Jyotirmoy Ash, Sandeep Chhatraband, Shuvankar Maitra and Vikash Kalra.

Along with this, there are various artists from Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Agartala, Tamil Nadu, Jammu, and Tripura on this list. However, one of the major highlights is Gnani Arts from Singapore. The artworks by ten artists represented by Gnani Arts will display a mix of figurative and enhancing styles in the vibrancy of colour while some will be seen displaying unique works. The paintings and sculptures of P Gnana, lingering on the figurative-abstraction idiom are likely to exude the universal emotion of love.

On what makes the Bengaluru edition different from that of Mumbai and Delhi, Rajendra says, "The difference lies in the 'scale'. The Bengaluru edition is comparatively on a small scale, unlike Mumbai and Delhi on the pretext of its population. However, one can expect many talented artists and some of the best art galleries here that uphold the ambition of India Art Festival." Rajendra also says that he and the team have observed a longing of people living in metro cities to visit art exhibitions.

Can one expect more such editions in other cities? Rajendra says, "After 5 years in Mumbai, we organized the festival in Delhi and similarly, after a few years, we are here in Bengaluru. So, 3-4 years down the line, people can surely expect us in their cities too."

When: May 5 to May 8, 2020; 11 a.m. to 8 p.m.

Where: Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath Art Complex, Kumara Krupa Road

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