madhvi subrahmanian

Organic / Abstract
18th January - 13th February, 2010

Having lived in three continents and in four countries in a span of 20 years, Madhvi Subrahmanian belongs to a world where cultural identities are blurred. Her work has been as inspired and altered by the challenges of new opportunities as by the limitations brought by new circumstances.

Other than migratory situations, her own personal experiences have also informed her work. As a mother, fertility and its varied references have influenced her greatly. Madhvi made a cast of her pregnant belly to mark a moment of time in her life. She uses the mould as a vessel to capture the essence of time and change. Incubation, growth and movement find repeated expression in her works.

Madhvi Subrahmanian's recent works made at a residency in Pondicherry and in her studio in Singapore are derived from natural forms such as the anthill and the seedpod. They evoke a world of votive sculptures that metaphorically narrate the story of her growth and passage. Flashing black and white checkered markings on tamarind trees in Tamil Nadu find their way into her forms, transforming simple geometrics and the graphic notations of a "road language" into mysterious primordial expressions.

The idiom of the ubiquitous road and its enigmatic imagery superimposed on Madhvi's primitive forms symbolically link her migratory experiences and define her interests and her work. The forms become a meeting place for the primal with the contemporary, the geometric with the organic and the ephemeral with the everlasting.

Her works can be further viewed on www.madhvisubrahmanian.com