24 x 24 inches
Watercolour on Paper
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About the Artwork:
Ravi Chaurasyia's artistic interest engages with geographical form, environmental crises, and natural resource (animal and human) ecological systems located in a landscape context. Living in an endangered situation, irrespective of history and culture, may lead to an inevitable end. Therefore, Ravi's work underlines the consequences of human actions and architectural waste that have primarily treated ecology and the environment as a means to achieve capitalist ends, furthering infrastructural development at the cost of nature.
Ravi has conceptually created several visualizations representing various dimensions of these above-stated concerns through various artistic mediums. A variety of visual representations and conceptual concerns are explored in most of the images on panels, photography installations, drawings, and paintings. In his work, there is an attempt to expand his artistic and thematic concerns through the use of different mediums. Most of his work is mixed media. In addition to experimenting with lighting to create effects or using various materials and their juxtapositions, he consistently tries to add more nuanced layers to the meanings in his works.
About the Artist (BIO):
Ravi Kumar Chaurasiya earned a Master of Fine Arts in Painting from the Department of Fine Arts, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi, and a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi.
Ravi Kumar Chaurasiya, a visual artist hailing from a small village in Ghazipur, is currently based and practicing in New Delhi. His interdisciplinary art practice spans diverse mediums, including painting, drawing, installations, (site-specific/site responding) photography, performative, and performance art. Ravi's focus lies in experimenting with light and color, which he presents through the process, subjects, concepts, and his choice of medium. The artistic process, bound up in time, holds significance from the beginning of a piece until its completion, bringing viewers closer to the work. Ravi's interests revolve around the life of any living or inanimate object, the temporal quality of animals, humans, geographical forms, climate change, architectural forms, and natural and cultural activities in the environment.
In his recent body of work, Ravi employs a realistic style and semi-figurative approaches in his art practice. His style invokes multiple elements of the world and its existence. Often, a deeply human figure is searching for its own path alongside the imaginative architect on one side and the symbolic experimental figure on the other. Ravi's work has multiple dimensions, utilizing various visual techniques and concepts. It is not limited to any single medium; most of his work involves mixed media. He is particularly interested in animal and human forms, specifically dogs, and how they can be understood as a metaphor for human society. His paintings seek to represent the discourse on the environment and how human interventions have affected it.
Ravi Kumar Chaurasiya has been a part of several residencies around India and abroad. Some of the recent ones include a two-month artist residency in Mumbai in 2023, Avolon Global Artist Residency at RHA Gallery, Dublin, Ireland, in 2019, Dharti Artist Residency as part of Serendipity Art Festival in New Delhi in 2018, a three-day Kala Sakshi Memorial Trust Art Residency at Sanskriti Kendra, New Delhi, in 2016 and 2017, and a 14-day Art Residency Program by the National Lalit Kala Academy in Bengaluru in 2016. He has also participated in the Foundation for Indian Contemporary Art workshop in New Delhi and the Kochi Student Biennale Wall Project as part of the Kochi Muziris Biennale.
Ravi Kumar Chaurasiya has exhibited shows, including "Infusing Poetry into Urban Dystopia" at Dhoomimal Art Gallery, New Delhi, India, in 2022, "Around the Present Living Hope," supported by the RAZA Foundation, New Delhi, India, in 2022, and "City of Life" at M.F. Husain Art Gallery, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi, India, in 2018. He also had a solo show titled "Humanity" at the Royal Hibernian Academy Art Gallery in Dublin, Ireland, in 2019.
Achievements:
Ravi Kumar Chaurasiya has received several awards, including the Junior Fellowship Award from the Ministry of Culture, CCRT, New Delhi, in 2023, the Prafulla Dahanukar Art Foundation State Award for Painting in Mumbai in 2019, and the title of Gold Medalist in Post Graduation (MFA) in Painting from Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi. He also received the Ravi Jain Fellowship from Dhoomimal Art Gallery, New Delhi, in 2017, and the Kala Sakshi Memorial Trust Award in New Delhi in 2017. Additionally, he was honored with the Avalon Global Studio Art Residency Award in Dublin, Ireland, in 2019, and the Dharti Art Residency as part of the Serendipity Art Festival in New Delhi in 2018.
