Biography
Gauri Gill (b. 1970) earned a BFA (Applied Art) from the College of Art, New Delhi, BFA (Photography) from Parsons School of Design in NYC, and MFA (Art) from Stanford University in California. She has exhibited within India and internationally, including the the Kochi Biennale; Freer and Sackler Galleries of Art at the Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC; Philadelphia Museum of Art; Wiener Library, London; Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; Whitechapel Gallery, London; Herbert F. Johnson Museum at Cornell University and National Gallery of Art, Warsaw. Her work is in the collections of prominent North American and Indian institutions, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Freer and Sackler Galleries of Art at the Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC; Deutsche Bank, Frankfurt and Fotomuseum, Winterthur, and in 2011 she was awarded the Grange Prize, Canada’s foremost award for photography.
Gill’s practice is complex because it contains several lines of pursuit. These include a now seventeen year long engagement with marginalised communities in rural Rajasthan — including Notes from the Desert, Jannat, Balika Mela, Birth Series and Ruined Rainbow. She has explored human displacement and the immigrant experience in series such as The Americans and What Remains. Projects such as the 1984 notebooks highlight her sustained belief in collaboration and ‘active listening’, and in using photography as a memory practice. Her most recent series, Fields of Sight, is an equal collaboration with a renowned folk artist, combining the contemporary language of photography with the ancient one of Warli drawing to co-create new narratives. Working in both black and white and colour, Gill’s work addresses the twinned Indian identity markers of class and community as determinants of mobility and social behaviour. In her work, there is empathy, surprise, and a human concern over issues of survival.
EDUCATION
2002: M.F.A. Art Stanford University, California
1994: B.F.A. Photography, Parsons School of Design, New York.
1992: B.F.A. Applied Art, Delhi College of Art, New Delhi
SOLO SHOWS
2016
‘Notes from the Desert: Photographs by Gauri Gill’, Sackler Gallery at the Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC
‘The Mark on the Wall’, Galerie Mirchandani and Steinruecke, Mumbai
2014
'Balika Mela' and 'Jannat', Thomas Erben Gallery, New York
2012
‘Balika Mela’, Nature Morte Gallery, New Delhi; Book Launch at Fotomuseum, Winterthur
2011
‘What Remains’, Green Cardamom Gallery, London
2010
‘Notes from the Desert’, Nature Morte Gallery, New Delhi; Matthieu Foss Gallery, Mumbai; Focus Gallery, Chennai; Urmul Setu Sansthan, Lunkaransar
2008 – 11
‘The Americans’, Bose Pacia Gallery, Kolkata; Chatterjee and Lal Gallery, Mumbai; Nature Morte Gallery, New Delhi; Thomas Welton Art Gallery, Stanford University; Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago; Bose Pacia Gallery, New York; Missisauga Central Library, Missisauga
SELECTED TWO PERSON/GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2016-17
‘Kochi-Muziris Biennale’, Kochi, Kerala
2016
'Dislocation/Negotiating Identity: Contemporary Photographs from South and Southeast Asia', Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton
'Unsuspending Disbelief', Curated by Laura Letinsky, Logan Gallery, University of Chicago, Chicago
'Tabiyat: Medicine and Healing in India' Curated by Ratan Vaswani, Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya, Mumbai and 'Jeevanchakra', Curated by Latika Gupta, Akar Prakar, Kolkata
2015
'Picture This: Contemporary Photography and India', Curated by Nathaniel Stein, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
'Ruins and Fabrications', Curated by Bakirathi Mani, Twelve Gates Arts, Philadelphia
‘POST DATE: Photography and Inherited History in India', Curated by Jodi Throckmorton, San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose; Ulrich Museum of Art, Kansas
'Nameless here for evermore', Khoj International Artists Association, New Delhi
'My Memory, Your History: Narratives on the North', Curated by Priya Pall, Birla Academy of Art and Culture, Kolkata
2014
'The Missing Pavilion', Curated by Gayatri Sinha and JNU students, School of Arts and Aesthetics, JNU, New Delhi
‘Ways of Seeing: Gauri Gill and Seher Shah’, Experimenter Gallery, Kolkata
‘1984’, The Wiener Library, London
‘Rectangular Squares’, Curated by Esa Epstein, Sepia Eye Gallery, New York
‘Punctum Reflections on Photography’, Curated by Seamus Healey, Salzburger Kunstverein, Salzburg
‘Invisible Cities’, Curated by Bhooma Padmanabhan, Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi
'Ganjad Portraits', Regal Cinema Building, Connaught Place, New Delhi; Ganjad Primary School, Ganjad
'Forms of Activism: 25 years of Sahmat', Lalit Kala Academy, New Delhi
‘Insert 2014’, Curated by Raqs Media Collective, Indira Gandhi National Center for the Arts, New Delhi
2013
'Aethetic Bind Citizen Artist: forms of address', Curated by Geeta Kapur, Chemould Gallery, Mumbai
'Delhi Photo Festival', Habitat Center, New Delhi
'Lines of Control: Partition as a productive space', Curated by Iftikhar Dadi and Hammad Nasar, Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University
'Duende', Curated by Gitanjali Dang, Rote Fabrik, Zurich
'A Photograph is Not an Opinion – Contemporary Photography by Women', Curated by Sunil Gupta and Veerangana Solanki, Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai
2012
‘The Needle on the Gauge’, Curated by Ranjit Hoskote, The Contemporary Art Institute of Southern Australia, Adelaide
'There Was A Country Where They Were All Thieves', Curated by Natasha Ginwala, Jeanine Hofland Contemporary Art, Amsterdam
'The Portrait: Contemporary Indian Photography', Curated by Devika Daulet-Singh, Fremantle Arts Centre, Fremantle
‘Lines of Control: Partition as a Productive Space’, Curated by Hammad Nasar, Iftikhar Dadi and Ellen Avril, Herbert F. Johnson Museum at Cornell University; Nasher Museum, Duke University
‘Cynical Love: Life in the Everyday’, Curated by Gayatri Sinha, Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, New Delhi
2011
‘The Grange Prize Exhibition’ Curated by Michelle Jacques, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto
'Step Across This Line', Contemporary artists from Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, Curated by Deeksha Nath, Asia House, London
'The Matter Within: New Contemporary Art of India', Curated by Betti-Sue Hertz, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco
'Generation in Transition', Curated by Magda Kardasz, Zacheta National Gallery of Art, Warsaw; Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius
'Staging Selves: Power, Performativity and Portraiture', Curated by Maya Kovskaya, Sakshi Gallery, Mumbai
‘Homespun’, Curated by Girish Shahane, Devi Art Foundation, New Delhi
'Picturing Parallax: Photography and Video from the South Asian Diaspora', Curated by Santhi Kavuri-Bauer, SF State Fine Arts Gallery, San Francisco
'The Americans', Curated by Haema Sivanesan, Mississauga Central Library, Mississauga. Featured exhibition in Contact Photo Festival (solo)
‘Something I’ve been meaning to tell you’, Curated by Sunil Gupta and Vidya Shivadas, Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi
‘Hall of Technology’, Artist Project, Indian Art Summit, New Delhi
2010
‘Light Drifts’, Curated by Eve Lemesle, Matthieu Foss Gallery, Mumbai
‘US TODAY: AFTER KATRINA’, Curated by Phillipe Durand and Joerg Bader, Institut d'art Contemporain, Villeurbanne, Lyon
‘Docutour’, Curated by Bose Krishnamachari, BMB Gallery, Mumbai
‘Where Three Dreams Cross’ – 150 years of photography from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, Whitechapel Gallery, London; Fotomuseum, Winterthur, Switzerland. Curated by Sunil Gupta.
‘Punctum 1 – A critical look at the landscape in South Asian Photography’, Curated by Arshiya Lonkhandwala, Lakeeren, Mumbai
2009
‘Outside In: Indian Art Abroad’, Curated by Courtney Gilbert, Sun Valley Center for the Arts, Idaho
‘Rememory’, Two-person show with Tomoko Yoneda, Lucy Mackintosh Gallery, Lausanne
‘The Astonishment of Being’, Curated by Deeksha Nath, Birla Academy of Art and Culture, Kolkata
‘The Self and The Other – Portraiture in Contemporary Indian Photography’, Curated by Luisa Ortinez and Devika Daulet Singh, La Virreina Centre de la Imatge of the Institut de Cultura (City Council of Barcelona), Palau de La Virreina. Exhibition travels to Atrium in Vitoria
‘Shifting Shapes –Unstable Signs’, Curated by Robert Storr and Jaret Vadehra, Yale Art Gallery, Yale University, New Haven
2008
‘The Nature of the City’, Curated by Alexander Keefe and Nitin Mukul, Religare Art Gallery, New Delhi
‘Zeitgeist’, Curated by Latika Gupta, Palette Art Gallery, New Delhi
'Click! Indian Photography Now', Curated by Sunil Gupta and Radhika Singh, Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi and London
2007
'City Cite Site', Curated by Latika Gupta, Anant Art Gallery, New Delhi
'Photoquai', Curated by Helene Cerruti, Musee Quai Branly, Paris
'Public Places, Private Spaces' – Contemporary Photography and Video Art in India, Curated by Paul Sternberger and Gayatri Sinha, The Newark Museum, New Jersey
'Autoportraits', Photographic portfolio of 12 Indian artists, Khoj at Freize Art Fair, London
'Gill and Gupta', Two person show with Sunil Gupta, India International Center, New Delhi
'I fear I believe I desire', Curated by Gayatri Sinha, Gallery Espace, New Delhi
2005
‘Women Photographers from SAARC countries', Curated by Alka Pande, Italian Cultural Center, New Delhi
2002
Award Winners Show, Fifty Crows Foundation, San Francisco
1998
'In Black and White' – What has Independence meant for Women, Curated by Bisakha Dutta, Point of View, Lalit Kala Academy, New Delhi; Admit One Gallery, New York
1995
Alliance Francaise prizewinners exhibition, exhibition traveled all over India
BOOKS
1984, document released on Kafila.org, free to download, New Delhi 2013/2014
Balika Mela, published by Edition Patrick Frey, Zurich 2012
The Americans, published by Nature Morte/Bose Pacia 2008
COLLECTIONS
Museum of Modern Art, New York
Freer and Sackler Galleries of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC
Deutsche Bank Collection, Frankfurt
San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose
National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa
Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto
Fotomuseum, Winterthur
Devi Art Foundation, New Delhi
CURATING
2010: ‘Transportraits’, Curated an exhibition on women navigating public places in the city for the feminist activist group Jagori, to coincide with the Delhi Declaration on Women's Safety, New Delhi; the exhibit later travelled to schools and colleges across India.
2005: 'Nobody's Children', Curated Tarun Chhabra’s photographic work with Delhi's street children for NGO Youthreach, India Habitat Center, New Delhi.
2005: ‘1000 Peace Women across the Globe’, Photographed and exhibited images and text about the work of women activists across India for the activist group, Sangath. The work was shown in Delhi, Kashmir and the Northeast and later published as a book by Scalo.
TEACHING AND TALKS
November 2015: Master Class at FICA, New Delhi
April 2015: Workshop with MA class in Visual Arts, Ambedkar Unversity, New Delhi
Dec 2014: Workshop with MA class on Contemporary Practice, NID Ahmedabad
Dec 2012: Workshop with MA class on Contemporary Practice, NID Ahmedabad
Nov/Dec 2012: Part of external jury and subsequent workshop with the MA class at NID, Ahmedabad
Aug 2003 – Dec 2008: High School and Middle School photography at the American School, New Delhi
Nov 2007: Presentation and exhibition, Center for Social Action, Christ College, Bangalore
Apr 2007: Workshop with local photographers, Goethe Institute, Kabul
2003 – 2005: Series of workshops with local teenage girls through Urmul Setu Sansthan, Lunkaransar,
Jun 2002 – Jul 2002: Photography I, Cantor Center for the Arts, Stanford University
Feb 2002: Workshop on photography in Visual Anthropology seminar, Stanford University
Nov 2001: Presented work in Jim Goldberg's class on Documentary Photography, California College of Arts and Crafts
Sept 1996: Workshop on 'the personal voice in documentary photography’, Apeejay Institute of Design, New Delhi
OTHER
2006 – 2011: Co-editor at 'Camerawork Delhi' a free newsletter about independent photography from New Delhi and elsewhere
1995 – 2000: Photojournalist with ‘Outlook’ magazine, New Delhi, as well as freelance work for various other publications.
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
Prajna Desai: The Kids Aren’t All Right, Aperture magazine, 2017
Nabil Ahmed: Negative Moment: Political Geology in the Twenty – First Century, South, documenta 14, Issue 3, 2016
Annalisa Merelli: When an ancient tribal art depicts modern Indian life, Quartz India, 2016
Pooja Pillai: Stitched in Time, Indian Express newspaper, 2016
Nancy Adajania: Bearing Witness: Creations of the “Human Hand” in Gauri Gill’s photography, The Wire, 2016
Reema Gehi: Retellings, Mumbai Mirror newspaper, 2016
Chanpreet Khurana: The art of slowing down, Mint newspaper, 2016
Inderpal Grewal: Gauri Gill and Rajesh Vangad, Fields of Sight, Trans Asia Photography Review, 2015
Portfolio: ‘Another Way of Seeing, Granta magazine, 2015
The Salon: Conversation between Lola Mac Dougall and Gauri Gill, Johannesburg Workshop in Theory and Criticism, 2014
Jaideep Mazumdar: ‘Ways of speaking a trillion words, Times of India newspaper, 2014
Somak Ghosal: ‘Eye Spy: The work of mourning’ Mint newspaper, 2014
Deeksha Nath: ‘Violence and Resistance’ Review of Forms of Activism, Frontline magazine, 2014
Geeta Kapur: ‘Aesthetic Bind, Citizen Artist: forms of address, 2013
Jaspreet Singh: ‘Thomas Bernhard in New Delhi’, New York Times, 2013
Avtar Singh: ‘Returning to 1984’, Timeout magazine, New Delhi, 2013
Neha Thirani: 1984, ‘Mumbai’s ‘Focus’ Festival Showcases Women Photographers'. New York Times, 2013
Portfolio: ‘Extra-Urban’, Domus, Mumbai 2012
Aditi Saxton: ‘Do you see what I see’, Review of Balika Mela, Tehelka magazine, 2012
Trisha Gupta: ‘What is the ‘real you’, and other questions about photo portraits’, Sunday Guardian newspaper, 2012
Rosalyn D’Mello: ‘Gauri Gill’s New Book is a Chapter in the Art of Portraiture’, Artinfo.com, 2012
Nao Katagiri: ‘New generation of Indian Artists’, Bird magazine, Tokyo, 2012
Murtaza Vali: ‘Eluding Presence: Portraiture in South Asian Photography’, Trans Asia Photography Review, 2011
Portfolio: ‘Balika Mela’, Inge Morath Foundation, 2011
Portfolio: ‘Nizamuddin at Night’, Civil Lines, Edited by Mukul Kesavan, Kai Friese and Achal Prabhala, Harper Collins, New Delhi 2011
Portfolio: ‘Balika Mela’, Sunday Guardian newspaper, New Delhi 2011
Christopher Lord: ‘Professional and amateur pictures of war-ravaged Kabul on show in London’, Review in The National newspaper, Abu Dhabi 2011
Neha Thirani: ‘The Peacocks on the Periphery’, Review in Times of India newspaper, Mumbai 2010
Zeenat Nagre: ‘State of Discomfort’, Review in Time Out magazine, Mumbai 2010
Anita Dube: ‘Notes on Gauri Gill’s Notes from the Desert’, Art India Magazine, Mumbai 2010
Portfolio: ‘Notes from the Desert’, Du magazine, Zurich, 2010
Maya Kovskaya: Review in www.Artinfo.com, 2010
Jane Mikkelsen: ‘Nomad Land’, Review in Timeout magazine, New Delhi 2010
Mario Cresci and Radu Stern: ‘Future Images – A Collection of the World’s Best Young Photographers’, 24Ore Motta Cultura, Italy 2010
Von Feli Schindler: ‘Bilder des Glücks und der Tristesse’, Review in Tages Anzeiger newspaper, Zurich 2010
Portfolio: ‘Balika Mela Portraits’, Ojodopez, Spain 2010
Portfolio: ‘The Americans’, Gup Magazine, The Netherlands, 2010
Deepanjana Pal: ‘Beyond Photoshop’, Review in The Caravan magazine, New Delhi 2010
Alexander Keefe: ‘On Nizamuddin at Night’, Essay in Marg magazine, Mumbai 2010
Veerangana Solanki: ‘More than a thousand words’, Review in The Economic Times newspaper, New Delhi 2010
Himanshu Bhagat: ‘Art of the Here and Now’, Review in Mint newspaper, New Delhi 2010
Bakirathi Mani: ‘Viewing South Asia, Seeing America: Gauri Gill’s “The Americans”’, Essay in American Quarterly, March 2010
Deeksha Nath: ‘The Americans’, Essay in Special Issue edited by Shaheen Merali, Black, Take on Art Magazine, New Delhi 2010
Nilanjana Roy: 'Fighting for safe passage on Indian Streets', NYT, 2010
Ravi Agarwal: ‘Interview for KHOJ BOOK – Ten years of Khoj Artists’, New Delhi 2010
Paul Sternberger: ‘Me, Myself and India’, Essay in Photographies, London 2009
Christopher Pinney: Comments on The Americans, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago 2008
Portfolio: ‘Urban Landscapes’, Private Photo Review, France 2009
Marina Budhos: ‘The Uneven Promise of a New Land’, Essay on The Americans, Tehelka magazine, New Delhi
Aveek Sen: ‘Vast Native Thoughts’, Review in Telegraph newspaper, Kolkata 2008
Gayatri Sinha: Essay for The Americans, New Delhi 2008
Holland Cotter: ‘INDIA Public Places/Private Spaces Contemporary Photography and Video Art’, Review in New York Times newspaper, January 2008
Ella Dutta: ‘Holding the city open’, Review in Art India magazine, Mumbai, 2008
Bandeep Singh: ‘Personal Light’, Review in India Today magazine, New Delhi, 2007
AWARDS/RESIDENCIES
2013: Arts Fellow, Rockefeller Foundation, Bellagio, Italy
2013: Wall Art residency, Ganjad village, Maharashtra
2012: Residency at Space 118, Mumbai
2011: Grange prize, Toronto
2011: Chitrakala Parishath, Bangalore. Residency on New Media organized by Lalit Kala Academy
2005: Photography Residency at Khoj, New Delhi
2002: Fifty Crows Award, San Francisco
2001: Anita Squires Fowler Memorial Fund in Photography, Stanford University, 2001
2000: Nathan Oliviera Fellowship, Stanford University, 2000
1995: Alliance Francaise National Photography Contest, New Delhi
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