Rashid Rana Apposite | Opposite

Exhibition Dates : 10 April – 26 May 2012

Venues: Chatterjee & Lal | Chemould Prescott Road

Chemould Prescott Road and Chatterjee & Lal are pleased to announce Rashid Rana’s major solo exhibition- Apposite | Opposite - his first in India in four years. Rana, a resident of Lahore, is amongst South Asia’s most celebrated artists and has forged a special relationship with India over the past decade. This, his third exhibition in Mumbai since 2005, is his most ambitious yet. Spanning the entire area of two galleries, the exhibition incorporates both new and existing works and covers a spectrum of themes and media.

With nearly thirty works spread throughout the exhibition, Mumbai will be treated to the artist’s most iconic works produced during the last three years. On display will be never- before-seen explorations using video work as well as the major sculptural statement, Desperately Seeking Paradise II.

In Rana’s work the competing spheres of religion, politics, and socio-economics come close to forming another parallel entity; one that is both rooted and yet exists independently from the artist’s surroundings. This might be understood in terms of the physical, the psychological or the virtual. Multiple visuals derived from diverse sources, in mosaic-like settings, present complex views that, if decoded, relate to our scattered, shattered world.

The sheer scale at which Rana has conceived the present exhibition is testament to the importance with which he treats the Indian art scene and promises to be a treat for gallery- goers.

About the Artist:

Rashid Rana (b.1968) lives and works in Lahore, Pakistan. Solo exhibitions include Cornerhouse, Manchester (2011), Lisson Gallery, London (2011), Musee Guimet, Paris (2010); Art Public - Cabinet P.H., Geneva (2007); Chemould Prescott Road + Chatterjee & Lal, Mumbai (2007); Nature Morte, New Delhi (2006); Chatterjee & Lal, Mumbai (2005). Group exhibitions include Saatchi Gallery, London (2010); Gallery of Modern Art, Queensland, Australia (2010); Whitechapel Gallery, London (2010); Pacific Asia Museum, Pasadena (2010); Devi Foundation, New Delhi (2010); National Fine Arts Museum, Taiwan (2009); Asia Society, New York (2009).

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Chatterjee & Lal exhibits:

Photo-Sculptures are Rana’s investigation into the very nature of being of the objects that have been isolated for the artist’s study and observation. Whilst from afar the works tend to remind the viewer of the objects to which they refer, as one approaches it becomes clear that each work is a hard-edged cuboid; at the same time the imagery increasingly pixelates and, eventually, totally abstracts. The re-representation of the original object of reference takes place faithfully, even to the extent of the lighting conditions mimicking those apparent at the moment the objects were initially photographed.

The Pure Beauty Series are works that dwell on art-historical discourse surrounding the nature of beauty and the very different responses that have been generated. In particular this series is interested to juxtapose scientific, rational, investigations into beauty against more visceral, experienced, representations. This is achieved in the diptych by representing, in the left hand canvas, an abstract colour chart of thousands of bright colour blocks that are then re-assembled on the right hand canvas as a representational image of a bomb blast. The fact that both canvases in the diptych are composed of the same constituent colour blocks neatly collapses the divisions proposed at the surface level of the work.

Chemould Prescott Road exhibits:

An Idea of Abstract represents Rana’s engagement with formal concerns, including new work from the Language Series (2010-11). In the stunning large-scale sculpture Desperately Seeking Paradise II (2012), which appears to be a minimalist stainless steel sculpture from an angle and from the other it seems to depict a panoramic skyline of an imaginary city with high-rise buildings. Close-up, the bigger picture disappears and thousands of smaller images are revealed, depicting houses in Lahore.

Between Flesh and Blood dissects the body and physical relationships. On the surface, the series What Lies Between Flesh and Blood (2009) presents deeply textured, serene abstracts, reminiscent of Rothko. Viewed more closely the works reveal their unsettling detail, each composed of an intricate mosaic of thousands of tiny images of blood and skin, collected from disparate sources.

Photo-Mosaic video sees Rana developing his interest in creating tension between the presentation of a macro-image whose constituent parts are composed from thumbnails that generally destabilise the initial reading of the work.