‘Remembered Tales’: Artist Madhvi Parekh continues her journey in folk modernism with new works

Artist Madhvi Parekh, with a vocabulary that blends modernism with village art without being restricted to either, has furthered her exploration of folk modernism with new works that are replete with her fantastical figures and landscapes.

Artist Madhvi Parekh, with a vocabulary that blends modernism with village art without being restricted to either, has furthered her exploration of folk modernism with new works that are replete with her fantastical figures and landscapes. In her new exhibition at DAG, "Madhvi Parekh: Remembered Tales", Parekh's works are monumental in both subject and scale, informed by her lifelong habit of spontaneous drawings and everyday observations. The exhibition celebrates Parekh's enduring ability to turn remembered experiences into richly imaginative worlds that speak across time and place. Often resembling dreamscapes, or "playgrounds of imagination", Parekh's works are reflective of her bucolic upbringing and the memories she retains of her idyllic childhood.

Even as the figures, motifs, and the landscapes in the new set of paintings are based on her established vocabulary, they appear in layered ways, as she returns to techniques from the 1970s. In some paintings, textured backgrounds evoke village mud walls, in the others she combines images from across her practice into compositions that feel both familiar and new.

"Unapologetically different from other artists, Madhvi Parekh's work stands etymologically apart—not quite 'modern' as most viewers see it, and not quite folk. It is this quality of rawness that has convinced me of her importance to the Indian art world," Ashish Anand, CEO and managing director, DAG, said. "Madhvi ji's art exists before and beyond time. It is a singular symbol of what true art represents," he added. Together with the paintings, on display are rare original sketchbooks from the DAG's archive offering insights into her visual thinking and recurring motifs drawn from her growing years in Sanjaya, Gujarat, the cultural worlds of rural and urban India, as well as her domestic life.

Alongside a dedicated publication featuring a scholarly piece on Madhvi's practice by Dr. Rebecca Brown of John Hopkins University, personal interviews with Madhvi and Manu Parekh, and an essay by art critic Meera Menezes, the exhibition is accompanied by a three-volume set documenting five decades of her sketchbook practice.

The exhibition will come to a close on August 23.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)