Olivia Fraser | The Sacred Garden

THE SACRED GARDEN

OLIVIA FRASER THE SACRED GARDEN

GALLERY MISSION Established in 2000, Sundaram Tagore Gallery is devoted to examining the exchange of ideas between Western and non-Western cultures. We focus on developing exhibitions and hosting not-for-profit events that encourage spiritual, social and aesthetic dialogues. In a world where communication is instant and cultures are colliding and melding as never before, our goal is to provide venues for art that transcend boundaries of all sorts. With alliances across the globe, our interest in cross-cultural exchange extends beyond the visual arts into many other disciplines, including poetry, literature, performance art, film and music.

Lotus Eyes, 2016, gold leaf, pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 22 x 44 inches/55.9 x 111.8 cm 6

ARTIST STATEMENT The paintings in this exhibition developed out of my interest in and practice of yoga. Within Indian yogic tradition, the practice of meditation is rooted in visualizations, mainly from landscape, in particular lotuses and linking them with the metaphysical. There is a meditational journey to be undertaken with the sahasrara, or 1,000-petalled lotus (deemed the ultimate lotus), used as a visual aid in order to reach the absolute. I also use figurative imagery associated with bhakti or devotion—eyes, hands and feet—as a means of travelling through and engaging with this metaphysical landscape.

The garden, an enclosed and cultivated area of landscape that’s formalized and acted upon, is

fundamental to my work. I take the vocabulary of landscape—trees, flowers, rivers, mountains and sky—and I deconstruct and reduce it to its essence.

But I am concerned with inner landscapes rather than external ones, so the majority of my works are painted or enclosed within a square format reflecting the idea of a mandala with its associations of energized sacred space and meditation.

I fell in love with miniature painting when I first visited the National Museum in Delhi in 1989. I was thrilled by the gem-like colors, detailed brushwork, iterative patterning and burnished flat surfaces, but I was also attracted to the confidence of the iconography, the symbolism, the meanings behind the use of color,

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shape and infinitely fine line. Seeing Maharaja Man Singh’s Jodphuri paintings from the early nineteenth century inspired by the Nath yogic tradition exhibited in the Garden and the Cosmos (2008) at the Freer Sackler Galleries, I felt I was witnessing something profoundly relevant and eternal. Themes inspired by the scriptures have always been used throughout art history, but this was a particularly Indian vision painted with an Indian art vocabulary and yet it had universal resonance.

I think Op Art has a deep affinity with traditional Indian painting, which can be highly stylized and frequently shows sensation and emotion, or rasas. I have sought to take this stylized illusion a step further by focusing on the iterative and paring it down to the minimal, ultimately striving to reach for an essence that may reflect my duality while also pursuing the idea of movement, which is innate in the texts and practices associated with yoga.

—Olivia Fraser

I’m interested in reaching back to an archetypal language strongly rooted in India’s artistic and cultural heritage that can breach borders and be relevant to my twin life between East and West—the same journey that yoga itself has made: something that was ancient and specifically Eastern which has become something universal and contemporary. As an outsider from Scotland, it was never an option for me to paint “traditional Indian miniatures.” It seemed clear to me to try to bring the two traditions together in my paintings, fusing the aesthetic virtuosity and precision of one tradition with the imaginative expressiveness and explorations into movement and perception of the other.

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OLIVIA FRASER THE SACRED GARDEN

Olivia Fraser applies pigment on paper with a clarity and intent that instinctually please the eye.

Strong color, evenly applied and satisfyingly thick, remains firmly within the boundaries of clearly delineated, often repeating, forms spread over a hand-made surface. Lines are unerringly clean, gold leaf adds luminous highlights and skilled brushwork brings delicate shading. Burnished and flattened by being rubbed with agate these elements become unified on a page, harmonizing together as they attain a final polish. These refined techniques were first born and developed in the Indian and Persian court ateliers of the past and were mastered by Olivia in the present-day workshops of Jaipur where they are still being partly practiced today.

But all artistic technique is ultimately in service of an idea, and the marriage of traditional methods with a new vision is at the core of Olivia’s work. Her imagery arises from an engagement with Indian yogic and meditative tradition, freshly interpreted. Lotus flowers, radial cosmic diagrams and essentialized blocks of color speak to both the abstract and concrete symbolic language of esoteric Hinduism. Certain pure and simplified motifs are found in the eighteenth and nineteenth-century Rajput painting when earlier generations of artists were also engaged with devotional texts and practices. While referring to the powerful painting styles of the past, Olivia’s creations interpret established idioms in the light of modern aesthetic movements, including minimalism, more remotely, surrealism and even contemporary conceptual art.

Left: Pause, 2015, stone pigment, Arabic gum, gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 32 x 32 inches/81.5 x 81.5 cm 11

The lotus flower has ancient roots in the art of India, its deepest association with notions of the sacred.

As a motif in art it was further renewed when it found its way back into the Subcontinent through a long journey from China, via the Mongols and the Mughals, appearing as part of the language of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century arabesque ornament. Olivia’s lotus flowers and buds are most closely evocative of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when Rajput paintings and pichwai temple hangings often featured a lotus-filled lake at the lowest horizontal register of a composition. The Breath series recalls the lotus flower in its various incarnations, both symbolically and stylistically.

Works such as Darshan or Rasa Lila offer fresh interpretations of bhakti (devotional) themes, paring down iconography but staying true to the subject. Color is a significant key to the meaning of the works, indicating deity, gender or sacred site. The titles of the works are also important in understanding them, but even if imagined separated from their nomenclature, the spirit and meaning of the paintings are quite evident.

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An unexpected visual meeting point with Islamic art also emerges in Olivia’s spiraling radial compositions.

Titled Churning, possibly referring to the well-known subject of the churning of the cosmic ocean in Indian court painting, these movement-filled works offer a new visual interpretation of that traditional subject.

However they also evoke the formal medallions of illuminated manuscripts or spiral fluting and inner domes of Islamic buildings which share similar designs.

The works of several modern and contemporary artists of the Middle East offer an interesting point of comparison.

Olivia Fraser learned first how to paint in England, in a very different idiom and style. She can control oil color on canvas, painting at a large scale with long, loose strokes. She can also paint with layers of watercolor, as various ancestors in her family did.

Working on wasli (Indian paper) with pigment is yet another step in this artist’s journey. Her technique may change again in the future. But her search for meaning is a constant.

—Navina Haidar, February 9, 2016

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Chakra, 2015, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 72 x 72 inches/182 x 182 cm

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Red Himalaya, 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 27 x 27 inches/68.5 x 68.5 cm 16

Blue Himalaya, 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 26 x 26 inches/66 x 66 cm 17

You Are the Sun, 2015, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 9 panels, 14 x 14 inches/35.5 x 35.5 cm each

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I Am the Moon, 2015, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 9 panels, 14 x 14 inches/35.5 x 35.5 cm each

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Churning I, 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 36 x 36 inches/91.4 x 91.4 cm 22

Churning II, 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 36 x 36 inches/91.4 x 91.4 cm 23

Essence, 2012, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 10.5 x 31.5 inches/ 27 x 81 cm 24

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Darshan II, 2015, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 27 x 27 inches/68.5 x 68.5 cm 26

Darshan, 2015, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 25 x 25 inches/63.5 x 63.5 cm 27

Kundalini II, 2014, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 48 x 36 inches/ 122 x 91.5 cm

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Chakra-I, 2013, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 25 x 25 inches/63.5 x 63.5 cm 30

Chakra-II, 2013, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 25 x 25 inches/63.5 x 63.5 cm 31

Chakra-III, 2013, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 25 x 25 inches/63.5 x 63.5 cm

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Yantra, 2014, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 26 x 26 inches/66 x 66 cm

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Rasa Lila, 2013, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 40.5 x 40.5 inches/101.6 x 101.6 cm

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Awakening, 2012, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 66 x 66 inches/168 x 168 cm

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Chakras, 2015, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 26 x 6.5 inches/66 x 16.5 cm 40

Porous Borders, 2015, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 36 x 36 inches/91.4 x 91.4 cm 41

Triptych: Shiv Shakti, 2011, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 25 x 75 inches/64 x 192 cm 42

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Radha Krishna, 2011, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 25 x 50 inches/63 x 126 cm

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Seven Seas, 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 26 x 6.5 inches/66 x 16.5 cm 46

The Sacred Seas, 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 27 x 27 inches/68.5 x 68.5 cm 47

Pilgrimage, 2010-11, stone pigment, Arabic gum and gold leaf on handmade Sanganer paper, 9 panels, 88 x 88 inches/223.5 x 223.5 cm

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1000 Petals (Blue), 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 36 x 36 inches/91.4 x 91.4 cm

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Breathe, 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 36 x 36 inches/91.4 x 91.4 cm

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Breath, 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 7 panels, 36 x 207 inches/91.4 x 525.8 cm 54

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One Breath, 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 10.5 x 39.5 inches/26.6 x 100.3 cm

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OLIVIA FRASER Born in London, 1965 M.A., Modern Languages, University of Oxford Wimbledon Art College

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS 2016 2014 2013 2012 2007

2003 1999

1994 1991

Olivia Fraser: The Sacred Garden, Sundaram Tagore Gallery, New York Grosvenor Gallery, India Art Fair, New Delhi Subtle Bodies, in association with Art 18/21, Norwich Olivia Fraser, M on the Bund, Shanghai Exhibition of Miniatures by Olivia Fraser, Sunaparanta Goa Centre for the Arts, India Olivia Fraser: Miniatures, Grosvenor Gallery, London Apparao Galleries/Shridharani Gallery, Triveni Kala Sangam, New Delhi Made in India, Indar Pasricha Fine Art, London Street Cries, Conversations and Gossip, Indar Pasricha Fine Art, London Andrew Usiskin Fine Art, London Carma Art Gallery, New Delhi

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS 2016

2015

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Gandhara-Art, Karachi at Art Basel, Hong Kong Grosvenor Gallery, India Art Fair, New Delhi Deck of Cards, British Council, New Delhi Forms of Devotion: The Spiritual in Indian Art, China Art Museum, Shanghai

2014 2013

2012

2011 2010 2009 2008 2004 1999 1996

Frontiers Reimagined, 56th Biennale di Venezia, Museo di Palazzo Grimani, Venice Forms of Devotion: The Spiritual in Indian Art, Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi Grosvenor Gallery, India Art Fair, New Delhi Kullu Perceived: Images of a Himalayan Valley, The Prince’s Drawing School, London Modern & Contemporary Miniatures, Grosvenor Gallery, London Miniature Rewind, Grosvenor Gallery, Art Dubai Grosvenor Gallery, India Art Fair, New Delhi Asian Art in London, Grosvenor Gallery, London Iconographic Investigations, Nature Morte, New Delhi Interrogating Conventions, Nature Morte, New Delhi Grosvenor Gallery, India Art Fair, New Delhi The Path of the Lotus, Grosvenor Gallery, London Kathmandu Arts Centre, Nepal Apparao Galleries, Chennai Apparao Galleries, New Delhi Kathmandu Arts Centre, Nepal Presteigne Art Gallery, Wales Portland Gallery, London The Clarendon Gallery, London

COLLECTIONS Public and private collections in Australia, Belgium (Museum of Sacred Art), France, India, Singapore, United Arab Emirates, United States and the United Kingdom.

SELECTED PRESS Mithila Review, “Art with Olivia Fraser” (March) Platform Magazine, “The Miniaturist: Olivia Fraser” (June) The Oloo Blog, “Q&A: Olivia Fraser” (August) Architectural Digest, “The Story Behind Artist Olivia Fraser’s Stunning Indian-inspired Works” (June) Financial Chronicle, “6th edition of India Art Fair gets off to a start” (January) The Times of India, “Where Art Hangs Out” (February) The Independent, “Moderate sales and lots of people at Delhi’s India Art Fair” (February) BBC News, “Olivia Fraser: Reinterpreting traditional Indian miniatures” (February) Madhushree’s Blog, “Some Snapshots of India Art Fair: A Fraser Legacy” (February) 2013 The Goan on Saturday, “The Sanghavi Salons” (September) The Times of India (Goa Times), “Sunaparanta” (September) Pilgrimage by Olivia Fraser featured on the cover of The London Magazine (April/May) Resurgence Magazine (March) Out of Print Magazine (March) Elitism Blog, “Miniatures” 2012 The Guardian, “Olivia Fraser: Mastering the

Hindu Miniature” (November) Culture24, “Art masters and Indian tradition in Olivia Fraser’s miniatures from India” (October) Caravan Magazine, “The Eye of the Beholder” (June) The Hindu, “Able Ways” (May) The Times of India, “Sacred Secular Geometries” (April) Tehelka Magazine, “Interview with Olivia Fraser” (April) The Sunday Guardian, “Arty explorations of

traditional idioms” (March) Blouin Artinfo India, “East Is East” (March) Olivia Fraser: A Passionate Quest by Dr. Virginia

Whiles (January) 2011 An Indian Summer Blog, “Olivia Fraser” 2016 2015

2014

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SUNDARAM TAGORE GALLERIES new york new york hong kong singapore

547 West 27th Street, New York, NY 10001 • tel 212 677 4520 fax 212 677 4521 • gallery@sundaramtagore.com 1100 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10028 • tel 212 288 2889 4/F, 57–59 Hollywood Road, Central, Hong Kong • tel 852 2581 9678 fax 852 2581 9673 • hongkong@sundaramtagore.com 5 Lock Road 01–05, Gillman Barracks, Singapore 108933 • tel 65 6694 3378 • singapore@sundaramtagore.com

President and curator: Sundaram Tagore Director, New York: Susan McCaffrey Director, Hong Kong: Faina Derman Exhibition coordinator/registrar: Julia Occhiogrosso Designer: Russell Whitehead

WWW.SUNDARAMTAGORE.COM Text © 2016 Sundaram Tagore Gallery Photographs © 2016 Olivia Fraser 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: Breathe, 2015, stone pigment and Arabic gum on handmade Sanganer paper, 36 x 36 inches/91.4 x 91.4 cm