Conceptual art exhibition leaves open an 'infinite' landscape

Conceptual art by three contemporary artists, exploring the fine balance between form, narrative and medium, takes viewers to an 'infinite landscape at the Exhibit 320 gallery here.

Displaying works from Ganesh Selvaraj, Kumaresan Selvaraj and Riddhi Shah, the exhibition is titled "The Infinite Present", and imbues a narrative of infinity to works made with simple media -- pieces of cut paper, hexagon shaped paper tubes of varying dimensions, pattern with knotted strings, or geometrical shapes.

The works, with their striking focus on form and its repetition, make the viewer look beyond what is obvious to the eye.

"Replicating that form, and setting it in relation to itself, and so resulting in two or three-dimensional paintings or constructions, is the basis of their work in the current exhibition," the gallery said.

How do the artists look at form?

"We approach everything in our living with our gained knowledge. For example, when we see some object, our knowledge says what it is, like trees, clouds, rain, and more," Ganesh Selvaraj told IANS, whose work titled "Approach Without Your Preoccupied Knowledge" encourages viewers to adopt fresh perspectives.

What, then, is important is to shed preconceived notions about any form, and imbue it with a different meaning.

"Perception of form is to see and understand it as it is, without comparing it with anything.

"When I look at an image, initially I form an impression, but I train my eyes to keep on looking beyond first impressions to develop visual literacy," Kumaresan Selvaraj told IANS, who believes art embodies a different visual language for everyone.

This vast subjectivity of the works also takes on the form of nomenclature, as many of the works on display are "Untitled", leaving another infinite landscape of meaning open.

"The title for me is sometimes defining the work, so I prefer most of the work untitled which is open for interpretation for viewers," Shah said.

The exhibition will conclude on Saturday.

--IANS

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