Where light meets life | N.S. Harsha exhibition @ London's Victoria Miro
LONDON'S VICTORIA MIRO gallery is hosting new works by Mysore-based artist N.S. HARSHA
N.S. Harsha’s ‘Camel and the tent times’ takes its title from a fable involving a merchant, his camel and the incursion of personal space. Curator and writer Grant Watson explains, “The story seems to be a warning against the danger of accommodating others. These paintings offer a reflection on the contemporary, but from a very different perspective.”
N.S. Harsha’s ‘Camel and the tent times’ takes its title from a fable involving a merchant, his camel and the incursion of personal space. Curator and writer Grant Watson explains, “The story seems to be a warning against the danger of accommodating others. These paintings offer a reflection on the contemporary, but from a very different perspective.”
And observing his work closely, this perspective becomes instantly visible. ‘Workers having a break’ is a work that is inspired by the popular 1932 photograph ‘Lunch atop a Skyscraper’. Harsha’s diverse workforce takes its break, held aloft by trails from a central column of lamps that extend into a nocturnal sky. Harsha describes the chandelier in his work as “studded with eternal human labour”.
Another work, ‘Harvest as a watermark’, is inspired by a paddy field visit where workers are seen with suited middlemen counting money, birds feeding on insects and cows grazing—indicating other ecosystems are in place. In Harsha’s works, all his subjects are shown within suspended spaces. n
—On view at Victoria Miro, 16 Wharf Road, London N1 7RW, till July 31
