With the Coronavirus at large, art galleries have had to explore new roads in order to showcase artworks. Perseverance 2020 is one such effort by Ampas Art Gallery

“Necessity is the mother of invention. People find new ways to display creativity and reach out to people over other avenues that could be possible without physical contact. We have seen a surge of online shows curation, stock webinars conducted by various galleries, curators and artists. A lot of effort has been put into staying relevant,” says Neelam Malhotra, the curator of Ampas Art gallery.

One such endeavour curated by Malhotra titled ‘Perseverance 2020’ is an attempt to weave together some sensitive works of art and bring them forth in this exhibition to invoke thought and contemplation.

“For most artists, sustainability is not easy and they have to struggle during the formative years. Here is where curators and galleries can come in but as the pandemic escalated the entire system suffered a huge setback,” says Malhotra.

The online group show features works of Amit Harit, Ashok Gulati, Debraj Goswami, Devidas Agase, Deepak Khandelwal, Gaurvi Sharma, Kavita Jaiswal, Sukesan Kanka, Pratul Dash. Rajendra Kapse and Yashvant Singh.

There is a certain meditative quality in artist Ashok Gulati’s work. He tries to reach out through the mind’s eye to go beyond and into the transcendental, while artist Yashvant Singh works with elements and symbols witnessed in the tribal community during his growing years. He instinctively began to incorporate them into his visual language.

Artist Rajendra Kapse’s work is candid and refreshingly bold. “All my works invoke satire, raising serious issues by means of my performative imagery. The imagery blended in my self portrait is done in calendar art style,” he adds.

Drawing attention to another serious issue are the works of Pratul Dash. Being a committed artist, he has been working towards creating awareness about climate change, from the time when it was not such an acknowledged or prevalent topic.

“I have worked with many media – paintings, drawings, photography, video art and have done various site-specific installations and performances to draw attention to the Anthropocene. Climate change has now started to have very real impacts on the everyday lives of people around the globe. Rising temperatures, floods, forest fires and many more that begin to threaten human existence as we have been used to for hundreds of years of recorded histories. Art has an important role to play in bringing awareness toward such neglect,” explains Dash.

On the same line, Devidas Agase talks about how his work is intense and sensitive and is concerned about climate change, socio-economic difficulties faced by farming communities, and their dependence on natural resources for their crops and cultivation. Even so their own survival, despite the global technological advancements and the unthinkable wealth of the few.

The exhibition is on view at Ampas Art Gallery’s website from October 14 to November 24