Concept Note: 

When we hear ‘landscape painting’, we are immediately transported to bucolic countrysides, mountains, seashores and greenery. Landscapes provide the escape, the relief that we seek from the daily hustle and bustle of life. Cityscape, on the other hand, is another kind of landscape that celebrates the architecture and spirit of a city, capturing its soul. Landscape paintings are often windows to a world we look forward to—a portal for the things we enjoy but do not possess or cannot experience as often as we wish to. 

The scenes of rural life in Indian villages take us back to our roots, as we cherish and remember the simplicity that has gone amiss in the modern world. The massive mountain peeping above the clouds instills resilience, while the vast and violent waves of the swelling sea remind us of our own insignificance. On the contrary, cityscapes reinforce the latent beauty in our own surroundings. In our daily hustle, we often forget to admire the grand architecture that surrounds us, the familiar corners steeped in memories. Being a part of the crowd, we hardly have the time to stand apart and observe “The apparition of these faces in the crowd:/Petals on a wet, black bough” (In a Station of the Metro, Ezra Pound). 

Thus, although landscapes have the power to transport one to a different zone, it is not only the spatial shifts alone but also the temporality of it all which is rather intriguing for the sensitive, artistic minds. The same landscape evokes different sensations in different seasons. At times, the landscape goes through major transformations in a day's time, changing bit by bit, hour by hour. They often reflect the mental state or the mindscape of the spectators onto the vast field of vision or the landscape before them.

Celebrating this rather popular and intricate style of art, for the AMI Arts Festival 2022, KCC invites artists to submit Landscapes (be it rural or urban). Selected artworks would be displayed at an exhibition cum sale at Rabindra Tirtha from 17th to 25th December, 2022.

About the Curator:

Suresh Jayaram is an artist, art historian, arts administrator and curator from Bangalore. He is the Founder-Director of Visual Art Collective/1.Shanthiroad Studio — an international artist’s residency and alternative art space in Bangalore, India. He taught Art History at Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath, the College of Fine Arts in Bangalore and later went on to become the Dean from 2005-2007. He was the principal of the College of Fine Arts, a part of the Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath located in Bengaluru. He is currently involved in art practice, urban mapping, archiving, curation and arts education. His keen interest in environmental and urban developmental issues influences his work. Bangalore’s Lalbagh: A Chronicle Of The Garden And The City - a chronicle and anecdotal narrative of the city and its oldest garden, is his latest publication.  

Artwork courtesy: 'Valley - I' by Sumartya Dutta