ARTIST STATEMENT
I am Alkananda Mukerji, and I grew up on the River Ganges. I have long since left the narrow streets of Benaras where life is awash in a flood of color and a constant stream of souls. Yet however so far I may find myself from those ancient riverbanks, my memory, my art, and indeed my very being -- these are forever caught up in the notion of endless, sacred flow.
People and faces, the surge of sounds, the unfathomably old commingling with the untarnishedly new -- all the rhythms and rhymes of India: this is the wellspring of who I am. I flow from this source, but I have become the river - changing, evolving, flowing. And what flows from me, my painting, it is often a conversation between the me that was and the me that is becoming. Memories, media, materials - bits of canvas, pieces of the past - anything I can get hold of: this is my art. I am the medium. I am the flow.
The subtle tones of Europe, and the soaring spirit of America: these flow in me too, for in these places I was also educated, alongside rivers with strange-sounding names like the Aliákmonas, the Thames, and the Mississippi. These are part of me now and I am part of them. And I am changed, though my wellspring stays the same. For I am a river, and a river is process. Art is process. Life is process.
I work in watercolor. I always found the free-flowing quality of watercolor interesting and ideal for experimentation. At first I thought this was some personal reaction to my source, to my life in Banaras, where everyone and everything is close, where there does not always seem room enough to grow, and where family and friend, and India itself influence one's decisions. I was foolish. Sometimes we do not see what we have already understood. And sometimes we do not understand what we have already perceived. Watercolor was not an escape. Experimentation does not undo who I was. Watercolor is my Ganges. It is my endless, sacred flow. It is who I was but also who I am and who I am becoming. It is my medium. It is me. I am a river. I am the flow.
And I am flowing. My work that you see here today is where I have arrived after years of work. But a river never simply arrives. I am changing, I am still becoming. And we shall all see where the flow takes me next, or where I take myself, or where I allow myself to be taken, for it is all the same.
My name is Alakananda Mukerji, and I live in Manhattan, between the Hudson and the Harlem. My name is Alakananda Mukerji and I grew up on the Ganges. I am an artist. I am a teacher. I work in watercolor. I am a river. |
Education:
MFA
SUNY, New Paltz, NY, USA
MFA
Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India
Ph.D., Art History
Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India
Higher Studies of Art
Greek Ministry of Education Scholarship, Athens, Greece
SHOWS AND MAJOR EXHIBITIONS
2008- The Hammond Museum in North Salem, NY
2009- Dowd Gallery, Cortland, NY
2008- Guild Art Gallery, New York, USA
2007,2008,2009- Queens Museum of Art, New York, USA
2006- Gallery Mai, Tokyo, Japan
2006- Gallery KiKi, Chiba, Japan
2005- IndiaArt Gallery, Pune, India
2004-Village Art Gallery, Katonah, NY, USA
2003-The Artists’ Guild, Fort Lee, NJ, USA
2002-ABC Gallery, Mount Vernon, NY, USA
2002-Meserve Coale Gallery, Greenwich, CT, USA
2000-The Soho Gallery at 678 Broadway, New York, New
York
2000-The Darisuz Gubala Gallery of Madison Avenue, New
York
1998-National Exhibition of Lalit Kala Academy, Lucknow,
India
1999-Passaic County College, Passaic, NJ, USA
2000-The Gallery of Farleigh Dickinson University, Teaneck, NJ, USA
1997-Birla Academy of Fine Arts, Calcutta, India
1996-All India Fine Arts & Crafts Exhibition, Calcutta, India
1994-National Exhibition of Lalit Kala Academy, New Delhi,
India
1992--Academy of Fine Arts, Calcutta, India |
