India

Biennialpreview

India's Kochi-Muziris Biennale turns ten—and gears up for its long-delayed fifth edition

Curator Shubigi Rao says this edition represents the resilience of art practices that have weathered the pandemic's storm

The global mental health crisis: Wellcome Trust launches international science and art project to help people cope

Mindscape initiative is a programme of residencies and exhibitions in museums across the world that explore psychological wellbeing post-pandemic

Mumbainews

Mumbai to get major new venue for art and performance—funded by one of India's richest families

The Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre will include exhibition halls and a 2,000-seat theatre

Controversial $1.8bn redevelopment of Delhi’s parliament complex enters second phase

A number of the Indian capital's major cultural institutions, including the National Museum, will be rehoused

'Indian art is in deep crisis': Anish Kapoor on his home country, 75 years after independence

Freedom of expression in India is dead because of Modi's "Hindu Taliban", the artist says

'A logistical nightmare': how deteriorating India-Pakistan relations affect the South Asian art trade

From smuggled paintings to cancelled visas, the heads of the subcontinent's fairs, biennials and galleries weigh in on the ramifications of the contested border

An Indian artist on staging a public art project across the Indo-Pakistan border

New Delhi-based Manisha Gera Baswani discusses her ongoing series Postcards from Home that photographs fellow artists in both countries

Manisha Gera Baswani

How partition divided a centuries-old manuscript between India and Pakistan—and continues to plague the region's heritage

Research on the Chandayan of Mulla Da’ud has suffered ever since 24 folios narrating the love story were split up across the border in 1947

India and Pakistan turn 75: exhibitions on independence and partition to see around the world

From Kolkata to Chicago, here are 11 shows that deal with the many histories of nationhood and freedom in the subcontinent

Gandhi's handwritten notes to Lord Mountbatten on the eve of India's partition go on show

Group exhibition at John Hansard Gallery in Southampton is curated by the Mumbai artist Jitish Kallat and includes works by Kader Attia and Zarina

Delhi's delayed Partition Museum set to open this winter

It will be India's second institution dedicated to the mass displacement of 1947

Leading Indian gallery Experimenter expands from Kolkata to Mumbai

It will move into a building currently occupied by Galerie Mirchandani + Steinruecke in the country's largest city and financial capital

South India's first private art museum to open in December

The Museum of Art and Photography in Bengaluru hopes to “push the needle” in a country where state funding for culture is being cut

Booksreview

At long last, Indian art from the long 20th century gets the forensic treatment in gargantuan publication

Over more than 700 pages, and with a polyphony of contributors, this book charts more than 100 years of subcontinental art, from the 19th century to the present day

How to get the next generation in India's youngest state to visit museums? Give schools money

The $17.4m scheme in Bihar has resulted in 33,000 young visitors to its main museum in Patna in a year

Booksreview

Book offering first major analysis of Amit Dutta's work puts Indian film-making in the spotlight

Leading experimental film-maker has exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and London's Tate Modern

Delhi's heritage buildings at risk of being sold to private buyers by right-wing government

The ruling BJP has been accused by a rival party of "selling off Delhi's history" following new licensing around historic structures in the capital

Indianews

India's largest art museum to open Islamic gallery

The Salar Jung Museum in Hyderabad contains around 2,500 objects related to Islamic faiths and traditions

Millions of dollars in smuggled antiques repatriated during investigation of disgraced art dealer Subhash Kapoor

Among the works returned to India was a $4m bronze statue of the deity Shiva Nataraja that was stolen in the 1960s from a temple and smuggled into New York

Putting 'trust' back into the art market: South Asian group show inaugurates unusual Mayfair gallery

Exhibition Hawala is the first show at Paradise Row Projects, a one-year, not-for-profit commercial space in London

Prizesinterview

'India is an example of fascism unchecked': Jameel Prize-nominated activist Sofia Karim on her samosa packets of solidarity

The London-based artist's Turbine Bagh project shines light on human rights abuses across South Asia

Crime news

Jailed diamond dealer and art collector Nirav Modi fights extradition to India on mental health grounds

Modi, who is currently held in Wandsworth Prison in London, is wanted for allegedly defrauding a state bank of £729m

Muslim mob attacks Hindu temple in Pakistan after eight-year-old boy allegedly urinates on library floor

Paramilitary forces deployed after local police fail to protect the religious shrine

Indian museum brings artist M F Husain back from the dead using AI

Visitors to the Museum of Art and Photography in Bangalore can pose questions to a "digital twin" of the late Bombay Progressive Group painter

Indianews

As India's death toll surges, £2bn renovation of Delhi parliament buildings continues as 'essential service'

Many are questioning how Prime Minister Narendra Modi can justify his "vanity project" as hospitals are overwhelmed with patients

Gaitonde breaks Indian art auction record—again—but Amrita Sher-Gil painting falls flat in uneven South Asian sales

A number of Indian artists made their auction debut this season, though several established names missed the mark

Rediscovered portrait by India's most famous female painter Amrita Sher-Gil expected to sell for $2.8m

1932 painting of artist's close friend has been out of the public eye for over 90 years but now comes up for auction at Christie's in New York

Podcastspodcast

The fight against Putin: artists on the frontline

Plus, India reconstructs its history and Navid Nuur on Walter de Maria