Surdashan Shetty’s solo exhibition Only Life, Myriad Places at Ishara Art Foundation in Dubai is on view until December 9, 2023.

Ishara Art Foundation, Dubai

Through 9 December 2023

Sudarshan Shetty will be the curator of the Visual Arts exhibition at Serendipity Arts Festival (SAF), one of the largest multi-disciplinary arts initiatives in the South Asian region. 
His project Look Outside This House aims to present indigenous inventions and informal industries that have origins in catering to real life circumstantial needs with lasting social impact on communities at large. The exhibition will highlight the need to support and nurture various indigenous approaches for the production of knowledge that sit outside the framework of mainstream institutions.

OLD GMC, PANJIM, INDIA From 15 to 22 December 2019

On the occasion of the 58th Biennale di Venezia, Jan Fabre, Prune Nourry, Sundarshan Shetty is participating in Glasstress 2019, show curated by Vik Muniz and Koen Vanmechelen. The sixth edition of Glasstress brings together a new lineup of leading contemporary artists from Europe, the United States, Latin America, India, and China in an ambitious exhibition exploring the endless creative possibilities of glass. Glasstress is a project by Adriano Berengo dedicated to supporting his mission of marrying contemporary art and glass. Since its debut in 2009 as a collateral event of the Venice Biennale, Glasstress has revived the traditional craft of Murano glassblowing by forging new alliances with internationally renowned artists and designers and has since become an unparalleled platform showcasing ground-breaking new works in glass.

FONDAZIONE BERENGO, VENICE, ITALYFrom 9/05/2019 to 24/11/2019

‘Shoonya Ghar’ will be on display for the first time in Mumbai.

Who is asleep and who is awake in this city, this home, this settlement, and this fortress of nothingness? Sudarshan’s exhibition ‘Shoonya Ghar’ is titled after a poetic work by 12th century poet Gorakhnath who also influenced his celebrated successor Kabir. The exhibition features a large scale multimedia installation piece that draws on sculpture, found objects and film. The sculptural piece in the outdoor plaza is constructed like an architectural set, while the film involves building and construction of the set alongside characters enacting scenes in which dramatic action mobilizes conventions of representing birth, death, dance, play and violence in local traditions of story-telling. Thus the set becomes the mise-en-scene for viewing the film.

The film reflects on the construction of the set or the stage, musical score and performance, and the viewer is offered these components in various states of construction and has the opportunity to put these modular pieces together in constructing a narrative that may draw upon their experience, imagination and history.

DR. BHAU DAJI LAD MUMBAI CITY MUSEUM, MUMBAI, INDIAFrom 07/11/2017 to 26/12/2017

Titled ‘The future is already here – it’s just not evenly distributed’, the 20th Biennale will be gathering 83 artists from 35 countries, presented across 19 locations including the city’s major art institutions and Cockatoo Island in Sydney Harbour.
More than 200 works spanning all mediums – with a focus on performance – will be presented free of charge to the public.
The 20th Biennale is curated by Stephanie Rosenthal, associated with an advisory group of 13 international curators, writers and theorists.

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIAFrom 03/18/2016 to 06/05/2016

Sudarshan Shetty (b. 1961) is a leading contemporary artist living in Bombay. His practice encompasses painting, drawing, installation, video/film and sculpture. He has exhibited widely both in India and internationally. He has been appointed artistic director and curator of the third edition of the Kochi Muziris Biennale. The artist lives and works in Mumbai.

The exhibition comprises an entirely new body of work in various media: video/film, sculptural installation and photographic images. The work draws on a poetic work by 12th century poet Gorakhnath. These poetic traditions populated their verses with the concrete symbolism of the built world and things within it, with references to nature and the environment as metaphors for the body and its beyond.

NATIONAL GALLERY OF MODERN ART, NEW DELHIFrom 01/15/2016

The Kochi Biennale Foundation announced Sudarshan Shetty as the artistic director and curator of the third edition of Kochi-Muziris Biennale.

Shetty, best known for his enigmatic sculptural installations, has long been recognized as one of his generation’s most innovative artists in India.

The artist declared he was happy to work towards the vision of a “People’s Biennale”.

The first two editions of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, held in 2012 and 2014, had a combined draw of nearly a million visitors. The biennale as a contemporary art project has renewed India’s cultural positioning and has placed Kochi and Kerala on the global cultural map.

KOCHI, KERALA, INDIAFrom 12/01/2015 

From Decembre 12th 2012 to March 13th 2013

The Kochi-Muziris Biennale is an international exhibition of contemporary art being held in Kochi, Kerala.
The exhibition will be set in spaces across Kochi, Muziris and surrounding islands. There will be shows in existing galleries and halls, and site-specific installations in public spaces, heritage buildings and disused structures.
Indian and international artists will exhibit artworks across a variety of mediums including film, installation, painting, sculpture, new media and performance art. (…)

Atul Dodiya interview

Kochi, Kerala, India