Sky, 2016 Graphite on paper 23” x 22 3/4″ (Each of 6)
Talwar Gallery is pleased to present Island, Muhanned Cader’s first solo exhibition in India. On view in Island are Muhanned’s recent body of collages, drawings, and paintings. Often creating works in series, there are meditative depictions of the sea, changing with the light of the passing of the day into the evening. Rolling towards the shore while they obscure the massive displacement and turbulence below, the sea waves in Muhanned’s work conceal as much as they reveal. Balancing between what is and what is not, the past and the present, Muhanned remains committed to a critical excavation of the neo-colonial agendas afflicting his home country. Drawing on a close observation of nature, the playfully inventive constructs are actually excised from printed matter on contemporary art, tourism, and institutionally commissioned cultural ephemera. Here Muhanned not only dismembers the paper but the ideologies themselves of a contemporary Sri Lankan society that has allowed unrestrained development in the name of progress. These violent mutations of enchanting forms created by Muhanned seem natural inhabitants in an increasingly deteriorating ecosystem of once an idyllic island.
Atlas of Forms, 2015 Oil on canvas 12″ diameter (each of 3)
Muhanned Cader was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in 1966, and he earned his Bachelors in Fine Arts from The School of Art Institute of Chicago in 1994. Since then, he has participated in a number of international projects. His work has been featured at the 6th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (APT) at Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, Australia; 1st Singapore Biennale, Singapore; Burger Collection, Hong Kong; Devi Art Foundation, Delhi; Herbert Johnson Museum at Cornell University, New York; Nasher Museum at Duke University, North Carolina and the 2nd Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Kochi, India.
Morning, 2015
Graphite on Paper
49 1/4” x 42”
Midday, 2015
Graphite on paper
49 1/4” x 42"
Midday (detail)
Twilight, 2016
Graphite on Paper
51 1/4" x 41 1/4"
Night, 2016
Graphite on Paper
51 1/4" x 41 1/4"
Springtime in Paradise, 2015-16
Acrylic and collage on paper
12" x 12" (Each of 50)
Overall Dimensions 80" x 200"
Springtime in Paradise (detail)
Springtime in Paradise (detail)
Springtime in Paradise (detail)
Springtime in Paradise (detail)
Galle Fort, Fort Kochi, 2014
Graphite on wood
Dimensions Variable (in 8 parts)
Galle Fort, Fort Kochi (detail)
Galle Fort, Fort Kochi (detail)
Galle Fort, Fort Kochi (detail)
Galle Fort, Fort Kochi (detail)
Galle Fort, Fort Kochi (detail)
Galle Fort, Fort Kochi (detail)
On the Island, 2015
Collage on paper
28" x 84" (in 2 parts)
Disco-very, 2015
Collage on paper
Dimensions Variable (In 11 parts)
Disco-very (detail)
Untitled, 2016
Oil on canvas
30” x 30”
Sky, 2016
Graphite on paper
23” x 22 3/4" (Each of 6)
Sky (detail)
Sky (detail)
Sky (detail)
Sky (detail)
Atlas of Forms, 2015
Oil on canvas
12" diameter (each of 3)
Evening in Paradise I, 2016
Acrylic and collage on paper
Overall Dimensions 39" x 74" (In 10 parts)
Evening in Paradise I, 2016
Evening in Paradise I (detail)
Evening in Paradise I (detail)
Evening in Paradise I (detail)
Evening in Paradise II, 2016
Acrylic and collage on paper
7" x 7" (Each of 12)
