Edges and Residues 26 - Steel Blue, Paynes Grey, White and Violet Red on Alizarin Crimson, Paynes Grey Cadmium Red and Burnt Sienna, 2023
Originally from India, Kanchana Gupta (b. 1974) currently lives and works in Singapore. Her practice yokes materiality with process and this is both the impetus and structure behind most of her works. The materials which she deploys range from quotidian socially loaded substances like vermillion powder, henna, and sandalwood, to oil paint and canvas, and to construction materials like jute and tarpaulin. Each brings its own particular identity, social symbology, texture, structure and colour, which she manipulates using a combination of studio and industrial processes irreversibly altering the inherent properties and contexts.
Her on-going fascination with the materiality of paint has seen her investigate the physicality of the medium in her two-dimensional works, mixed media and more recently through her sculptural installations. Her practice has been described as a process driven exploration of and response to, urban environments. The pressures of unprecedented migrations, rapid urbanisations and overwhelming globalisation are expressed through the extreme manual and industrial duress that she subjects her medium to. Paint set on a sub structure of quotidian material is ritually ripped, torn, detached, peeled, burnt and compressed to produce works that expose the strata of a deeply personal geology.
Her ongoing video explorations extrapolate the absence/presence of the human body which is only subtly alluded to in her earlier works. The videos meanwhile confront the trope of received femininity and its expected attributes.
Kanchana received an MA in Fine Arts from LASALLE College of Arts, Singapore where she was the recipient of ‘Dr. Winston Oh Travel Research’ award. Since then, her works have featured in numerous group exhibitions, both in Singapore and internationally: in addition to which she has had three one person shows in Singapore.
Her works are in institutional and private collections in Singapore, and in private collections in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Philippines, Japan, Hong Kong and USA. Her work is recently included in The Sceneries and Portraits of an Era - Featuring the Asia Collection of Benesse Art Site Naoshima at the Fukutake House Asian Gallery, Shodoshima, Japan.