NEHA VEDPATHAK I DWELL IN POSSIBILITY
NEHA VEDPATHAK I DWELL IN POSSIBILITY SUNDARAM TAGORE GALLERY SINGAPORE JUNE 4 – AUGUST 6, 2022
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I DWELL IN POSSIBILITY Sundaram Tagore Gallery Singapore is pleased to present new, tactile, abstract paper compositions by Indian-born Detroit-based artist Neha Vedpathak. The exhibition includes a selection of richly colored paintings from recent museum shows as well as a brand-new body of work exploring liminal spaces created especially for Singapore.
Suspended, Collapsed) at the Flint Institute of Arts in Michigan. She created the work in 2020 at the height of the pandemic, when pregnant with her first child. During the lockdown, Vedpathak lost all sense of time while simultaneously going through a sequence of pregnancy milestones that marked time in an acutely linear fashion.
Vedpathak (b. 1982), who moved to the U.S. from India in 2007, began receiving critical recognition early in her career. In 2018, the Detroit Institute of Arts commissioned her to create a large-scale paper installation for its new Asian wing. Currently, her work is on view in the museum exhibition Invisible Thread at The Baker Museum in Naples, Florida.
Intrigued by the duality of that experience, she began investigating concepts of time relating to space and motion. She created a small group of Loop paintings inspired by the idea of time collapsing. In these works, the fluid, circular motion of the spiral form reflects Vedpathak’s transition from feeling a loss of control to eventually surrendering to the experience. For an artist who finds contentment in the highly disciplined nature of her process, working through a prolonged period of unpredictability was a transformative experience—one that inadvertently prompted her next series.
Part painting, part collage, Vedpathak’s sensuous, textured constructions seemingly float while casting intricate shadows against the wall. The technique she invented to conjure this illusion appears deceptively simple: Using a pushpin, she plucks handmade Japanese paper, separating the fibers until the paper is transformed into swaths of lace-like material that she sews together and stains with pigment. It is a deliberate and labor-intensive process that can take weeks, even months to complete, making time itself an integral force in each work. The plucking has become a ritual of transformation, a meditation. The show includes select paintings from Vedpathak’s 2021–2022 solo museum exhibition Time (Constant,
In this new body of work, Vedpathak uses the image of a rainbow to express the fleeting, often imperceptible moment when we transition from one state of mind to another. The idea was inspired by a dazzling spectrum of color that streamed through a glass-block window in her studio. Vedpathak was struck by the way light travels from one medium to another. “It’s about that moment when two ideas meet or two attitudes collapse into one,” she says. “When we shift from one space to another, whether emotionally or physically, that’s when something magical can happen.” 5
The Woods Within Me, 2021 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 35 x 30 inches/89 x 76 cm
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Fundamental Pause, 2022 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 35 x 24 inches/89 x 61 cm 11
Two Loops, One Body, 2021 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 27 x 25 inches/68.6 x 63.5 cm
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Making Lucid Stains, 2022 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 36 x 26 inches/91.4 x 66 cm 15
Loop 1, 2021 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 35 x 33 inches/89 x 84 cm 16
Loop 2, 2021 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 36.5 x 29 inches/93 x 74 cm 17
The way they bend, 2022 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 33 x 27 inches/83.8 x 68.6 cm
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The minutiae of everyday life (Time), 2021 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 51 x 84 inches/129.5 x 213.4 cm
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In the wee hours (upon a hill) 3, 2018 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint on acrylic Plexi-sheet, 9 x 11 inches/23 x 28 cm 24
In the wee hours (upon a hill) 4, 2018 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint on acrylic Plexi-sheet, 9 x 11 inches/23 x 28 cm 25
After Time, 2021 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 36 x 29.5 inches/91.4 x 75 cm
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A crumb for me, 2022 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 17 x 14.5 inches/43.2 x 36.8 cm 29
Creased Hope, 2022 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 15 x 13.3 inches/38 x 33.7 cm
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Growth in Times of Death and Horror, 2021 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 54 x 62 inches/137.2 x 157.5 cm
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Rare Visit, 2022 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 35 x 24 inches/90 x 61 cm 35
Untitled, 2021 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 38 x 31 inches/96.5 x 79 cm
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Untitled, 2021 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 57 x 42 inches/145 x 107 cm
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Relief and Ecstasy, 2022 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 16.5 x 14 inches/41.9 x 35.6 cm 41
So many stars in the sky, some of them and some of me, 2018 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 80 x 80 inches/203.2 x 203.2 cm
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Untitled (Yet), 2019 Plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 58 x 52 inches/147.3 x 132.1 cm
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A B O U T N E H A V E D PATH A K Neha Vedpathak was born in Pune, India, in 1982, and moved to the United States in 2007. She began as an abstract-minimalist painter, but her career took a formative turn in 2009 when she was exploring ways to take her two-dimensional practice in a new direction. Her experiments with different media (and her desire to avoid toxic materials) led her to Japanese paper. Already in her repertoire as a painter, it became the focus of her practice. Her works have been shown at the Flint Institute of Arts and the Detroit Institute of Arts, Michigan; the National Indo-American Museum, Chicago; The Baker Museum, Naples, Florida; Arizona State University Art Museum, Tempe; Weatherspoon Museum, Greensboro, North Carolina; and Centre d’Art Marnay Art Centre, France. In 2021, Vedathak received the Gilda Award for painting from Kresge Arts in Detroit, which recognizes emerging artists who demonstrate exceptional potential through creative risk-taking and pushing the boundaries of their chosen art forms.
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S U N DA R A M TAG O R E G ALLE R I E S We have been representing established and emerging artists from around the world since 2000. We champion work that is aesthetically and intellectually rigorous, infused with humanism and art historically significant. We specialize in paintings, drawings, sculptures and installations with a strong emphasis on materiality. Our artists cross cultural and national boundaries, synthesizing Western visual language with forms, techniques and philosophies from Asia, the Subcontinent and the Middle East. We show this work alongside important work by overlooked women from the New York School. The gallery also has a robust photography program that includes some of the world’s most noted photographers.
N EW YOR K Chelsea: 542 West 26th Street, New York, NY 10001 • tel 212 677 4520 gallery@sundaramtagore.com
SI NGAPOR E 5 Lock Road 01-05, Gillman Barracks, Singapore 108933 • tel 65 6694 3378 singapore@sundaramtagore.com
LON DON 4 Cromwell Place, London, SW7 2JE President and curator: Sundaram Tagore Senior Director, New York: Susan McCaffrey Director, Singapore: Melanie Taylor Director, New York: Kathryn McSweeney Registrar: Julia Occhiogrosso Designer: Russell Whitehead Editorial support: Kieran Doherty
WWW.SU N DARAMTAGOR E.COM Text © 2022 Sundaram Tagore Gallery Photographs © 2022 Neha Vedpathak All rights reserved under international copyright conventions. No part of this catalogue may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any other information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. Cover: Fundamental Pause (detail), 2022, plucked Japanese handmade paper, acrylic paint, thread, acrylic polymer, 35 x 24 inches/89 x 61 cm