Profulla Mohanti, Padma (1979). Mixed media on canvas. 140 x 99 cm. © Prafulla Mohant. Courtesy Jhaveri Contemporary.
We picked out this wonderful work showing with Jhaveri Contemporary for Frieze Art Fair's 2020 online viewing rooms.
Led by Zoe Whitley (Director of Chisendale Gallery), Prafulla Mohanti features in Possessions: Spirituality and the Art of our Time, Frieze's new curated section focusing on the theme of spirituality in contemporary art.
After graduating as an architect in Bombay, Mohanti moved to the U.K. in 1960 working as an architect-town planner in London. Now devoting himself to painting and writing, Mohanti's mixed media works—inspired by Indian traditional theories of cosmogony—feature concentric circles in vivid colours.
Born and having grown up in Nanpur, a village located in the east of Odisha, India, Mohanti's paintings are simultaneously rooted in his village culture, particularly yoga and tantra.
Reflecting on old village life and his move to the U.K., Mohanti notes 'Actually, I have never left the village, either physically or emotionally or spiritually because for me the two worlds are not really separate, they are one. Wherever I go, I carry my village inside of me'.
