Mrinalini Mukherjee
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Mrinalini Mukherjee (1949 – 15 February 2015) was an Indian sculptor. Known for her distinctly contemporary style and use of dyed and woven
hemp Hemp, or industrial hemp, is a plant in the botanical class of ''Cannabis sativa'' cultivars grown specifically for industrial and consumable use. It can be used to make a wide range of products. Along with bamboo, hemp is among the fastest ...
fibre, an unconventional material for sculpting, she had a career lasting over four decades from the 1970s to the 2000s. Mukherjee's body of work is a part of public collections at, among others, the
Museum of Modern Art, Oxford Modern Art Oxford is an art gallery established in 1965 in Oxford, England. From 1965 to 2002, it was called The Museum of Modern Art, Oxford. The gallery presents exhibitions of modern and contemporary art. It has a national and international ...
; the
National Gallery of Modern Art The National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA) is the premier art gallery under Ministry of Culture, Government of India. The main museum at Jaipur House in New Delhi was established on 29 March 1954 by the Government of India, with subsequent b ...
, New Delhi;
Tate Modern Tate Modern is an art gallery in London, housing the United Kingdom's national collection of international Modern art, modern and contemporary art (created from or after 1900). It forms part of the Tate group together with Tate Britain, Tate Live ...
, London;
The Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the third-largest museum in the world and the largest art museum in the Americas. With 5.36 million v ...
, New York; and the
Stedelijk Museum The Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (; Municipal Museum Amsterdam), colloquially known as the Stedelijk, is a museum for modern art, contemporary art, and design located in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
, Amsterdam. The artist's personal archive is digitised and freely accessible on
Asia Art Archive Asia Art Archive (AAA) is a nonprofit organisation based in Hong Kong that documents the recent history of contemporary art in Asia within an international context. AAA incorporates material that members of local art communities find relevant ...
's website.


Early life and education

Mukherjee was born in 1949, in
Mumbai, India Mumbai ( ; ), also known as Bombay ( ; its official name until 1995), is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra. Mumbai is the financial centre, financial capital and the list of cities i ...
to artists
Benode Behari Mukherjee Benode Behari Mukherjee (7 February 1904 – 11 November 1980) was an Indian artist from West Bengal state. Mukherjee was one of the pioneers of Indian modern art and a key figure of Contextual Modernism. He was one of the earliest artists in ...
and Leela Mukherjee. The only child of her parents, she was brought up in the hill town of
Dehradun Dehradun (), also known as Dehra Doon, is the winter capital and the List of cities in Uttarakhand by population, most populous city of the Indian state of Uttarakhand. It is the administrative headquarters of the eponymous Dehradun district, d ...
(in present
Uttarakhand Uttarakhand (, ), also known as Uttaranchal ( ; List of renamed places in India, the official name until 2007), is a States and union territories of India, state in North India, northern India. The state is bordered by Himachal Pradesh to the n ...
), where she attended
Welham Girls' School Welham Girls' School is a private boarding school for girls located in Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India. History The school was founded by Hersilia Susie Oliphant, who had previously set up Welham Boys' School. She named the schools after her ...
, and spent her summer vacations in Santiniketan. Mukherjee went to study Bachelor of Fine Arts (Painting) at
Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, formerly Baroda College, is a public university in the city of Vadodara, Gujarat, India. Originally established as a college in 1881, it became a public university on April 30, 1949 and was renamed after ...
. Thereafter, she did a Post Diploma in Mural Design from the same university under the Indian artist K.G. Subramanyan who was also a member of the Fine Arts Faculty at the university. Her studies included working Italian Fresco and other conventional techniques. She worked with natural fibres as a medium for murals.


Career

In the 1960s and 1970s Mukherjee used local hemp and jute to create knotted designs outside the macrame designs popular at the time. Her first solo exhibition was held at Sridharani Art Gallery in New Delhi in 1972. It featured warped, woven forms in dyed natural fibresa series of works that brought her recognition. She named her sculptures after deities of fertility and were seen as sensual and suggestive. Mukherjee received a
British Council The British Council is a British organisation specialising in international cultural and educational opportunities. It works in over 100 countries: promoting a wider knowledge of the United Kingdom and the English language (and the Welsh lang ...
Scholarship for Sculpture in 1971. While most of Mukherjee's early work was characterised by the use of natural
hemp Hemp, or industrial hemp, is a plant in the botanical class of ''Cannabis sativa'' cultivars grown specifically for industrial and consumable use. It can be used to make a wide range of products. Along with bamboo, hemp is among the fastest ...
fibre, she also used
ceramic A ceramic is any of the various hard, brittle, heat-resistant, and corrosion-resistant materials made by shaping and then firing an inorganic, nonmetallic material, such as clay, at a high temperature. Common examples are earthenware, porcela ...
and
bronze Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals (such as phosphorus) or metalloid ...
later in her career. Her bronze work emerged in the 2000s, "when the artist began casting forms moulded directly in wax using the traditional lost-wax process, whose surfaces she finished with tools obtained from a local dentist". Mukherjee was invited to the
Museum of Modern Art, Oxford Modern Art Oxford is an art gallery established in 1965 in Oxford, England. From 1965 to 2002, it was called The Museum of Modern Art, Oxford. The gallery presents exhibitions of modern and contemporary art. It has a national and international ...
to participate in an exhibition curated by David Elliott in 1994. The same exhibition further travelled to other cities in the United Kingdom over the course of the next few months. Mukherjee later participated in an international workshop that was held
Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...
in 1996. Around this time she started to experiment with ceramics. In 2019, the
Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of larg ...
hosted a posthumous retrospective of Mukherjee's work called "Phenomenal Nature: Mrinalini Mukherjee". In her review of the exhibition, art critic Nageen Shaikh observes: "Perhaps the principal lesson that historians, critics, and viewers acquire with an astounding retrospective like Mukherjee's is how art can resist being viewed as delineated under a methodical Western canon. Her massive oeuvre is not fully representational, neither completely abstract. It learns from her native history and tradition, while educating us in new ways to engage with subtleties of her work."


Technique and style

Mukherjee was influenced by traditional
Indian Indian or Indians may refer to: Associated with India * of or related to India ** Indian people ** Indian diaspora ** Languages of India ** Indian English, a dialect of the English language ** Indian cuisine Associated with indigenous peoples o ...
and historic European sculpture, folk art, modern design, local crafts and textiles. Knotting was one of her main techniques; she worked intuitively and never worked based on sketches, models or preparatory drawings. The authors of ''Indian Contemporary Art Post-Independence'' dubbed Mukherjee as a "unique voice in contemporary Indian art", and remarked "The sculptures knotted painstakingly with hemp ropes in earthy or rich glowing colours evoke a fecund world of burgeoning life, lush vegetation, iconic figures." Acknowledging the note of sexuality manifested in the "phallic forms", they added "the mysterious folds and orifices, the intricate curves and drapes. There is a sensuous, tactile quality to her work which exercises a compelling hold on the viewer." Mukherjee studied under
K. G. Subramanyan Kalpathi Ganpathi "K.G." Subramanyan (5 February 1924 29 June 2016) was an Indian artist. He was awarded the Padma Vibhushan in 2012. Life Subramanyan was born in Tamil Brahmin family on 5th February, 1924 in Kuthuparamba in Kerala, India ...
, and derived heavily from his artistry. Sonal Khullar writing on Subramanyan's influence on her wrote in ''Worldly Affiliations'' Mukherjee a former student, " ..use jute, wood, rope, and cow dung to create environments at once magical and mundane. Their inventiveness with visual language and investments in ordinary materials are a legacy of Subramanyan's teaching, writing and art-making."
Art historian Art history is the study of artistic works made throughout human history. Among other topics, it studies art’s formal qualities, its impact on societies and cultures, and how artistic styles have changed throughout history. Traditionally, the ...
and independent curator Deepak Ananth also ascribed Mukherjee's predilection for modest, earthly materials to her influence from Subramanyan, and in turn from the history of Indian artisanal craft. In an essay entitled "The Knots are Many But the Thread is One", Ananth wrote, "As if in harmony with the vegetable realm from which her medium is derived, the leading metaphor of Mukherjee's work comes from the organic life of plants. Improvising upon a motif or image that serves as her starting point the work's gradual unfolding itself becomes analogous to the stirring into maturation of a sapling."


Influences

In the context of the pedagogy professed by K G Subramanyan, Mukherjee's decision to work in a material traditionally associated with her craft rather than "high art" reflects her teacher's conscious attempts to overcome what they considered to be a staple polarity in Modernism, not least in view of the extreme richness and continuing actuality of traditional artisanal skills in India and the sheer versatility of popular vernacular idioms.


Death

Mrinalini Mukherjee was hospitalized before her 2015 retrospective exhibition at the
National Gallery of Modern Art The National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA) is the premier art gallery under Ministry of Culture, Government of India. The main museum at Jaipur House in New Delhi was established on 29 March 1954 by the Government of India, with subsequent b ...
in New Delhi. She died a week later, at the age of 65.


Public collections

*
Modern Art Oxford Modern Art Oxford is an art gallery established in 1965 in Oxford, England. From 1965 to 2002, it was called The Museum of Modern Art, Oxford. The gallery presents exhibitions of modern and contemporary art. It has a national and international ...
,
Oxford Oxford () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and non-metropolitan district in Oxfordshire, England, of which it is the county town. The city is home to the University of Oxford, the List of oldest universities in continuou ...
*
Yorkshire Sculpture Park The Yorkshire Sculpture Park (YSP) is an art gallery, with both open-air and indoor exhibition spaces, in West Bretton, Wakefield, in West Yorkshire, England. It shows work by British and international artists, including Henry Moore and Barb ...
, Yorkshire *
Stedelijk Museum The Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (; Municipal Museum Amsterdam), colloquially known as the Stedelijk, is a museum for modern art, contemporary art, and design located in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
, Amsterdam *
National Gallery of Modern Art The National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA) is the premier art gallery under Ministry of Culture, Government of India. The main museum at Jaipur House in New Delhi was established on 29 March 1954 by the Government of India, with subsequent b ...
, New Delhi *
Lalit Kala Akademi The Lalit Kala Akademi or National Academy of Art (LKA) is India's national academy of fine arts. It is an autonomous organisation, established in New Delhi in 1954 by Government of India to promote and propagate understanding of Indian art, in ...
, New Delhi * Roopankar Museum of Art, Bharat Bhawan,
Bhopal Bhopal (; ISO 15919, ISO: Bhōpāl, ) is the capital (political), capital city of the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh and the administrative headquarters of both Bhopal district and Bhopal division. It is known as the ''City of Lakes,'' due to ...
* Fine Arts Museum,
Panjab University, Chandigarh Panjab University (PU) is an Indian collegiate public state university located in Chandigarh. Funded through both State and Union governments, it is considered a state university. It traces its origins to the University of the Punjab in Laho ...
* India Tourism Development Corporation, New Delhi * India Institute of Immunology, New Delhi *
Tate Modern Tate Modern is an art gallery in London, housing the United Kingdom's national collection of international Modern art, modern and contemporary art (created from or after 1900). It forms part of the Tate group together with Tate Britain, Tate Live ...
, London * Government Museum and Art Gallery,
Chandigarh Chandigarh is a city and union territory in northern India, serving as the shared capital of the states of Punjab and Haryana. Situated near the foothills of the Shivalik range of Himalayas, it borders Haryana to the east and Punjab in the ...
*
Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...
, New York *
The Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the third-largest museum in the world and the largest art museum in the Americas. With 5.36 million v ...
, New York


See also

* * *


References


Bibliography

* * *


Further reading

* Ananth, Deepak, et al. ''Mrinalini Mukherjee''. New York: The Shoestring Publisher, 2019. * *


External links


Mrinalini Mukherjee Archive
at sia Art Archive {{DEFAULTSORT:Mukherjee, Mrinalini Indian contemporary sculptors 20th-century Indian sculptors 21st-century Indian sculptors 1949 births 2015 deaths Artists from Mumbai Women artists from Maharashtra Indian LGBTQ sculptors Welham Girls' School alumni 20th-century Indian women sculptors 21st-century Indian women sculptors