JUPITER PRADHAN
Visual Artist, Kathmandu, Nepal
BIOGRAPHY AND PROJECTS
Jupiter Pradhan, holds a BFA in painting from the Tribhuvan University (2005) and an MFA in painting from the University of Development Alternative, Dhaka, Bangladesh (2009). Pradhan is an interdisciplinary visual artist whose artistic expression includes performance, video, painting and installation. His artworks deal with the social, political and cultural intermingling in modern times. He truly believes that art from time immemorial has functioned as the reflection of reality and beyond. Beyond, because art lets us see the subtle system of reality that usually remains hidden from our sight and understanding. He has made an effort in bringing such hidden aspects of dynamic yet subtle reality that we live in. He has been trying to find the resources of different art forms from Asian. Sometimes involving both the local artist and the artisan, he works with various themes and different techniques. This leads him into organizing different (national and international) art workshops, art festivals and residencies which benefit the community at large.
He has had solo exhibitions in Kathmandu, Osaka and the Fukuoka Asian Art Museum, Japan. Pradhan’s works have also been included in several group exhibitions in Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Japan, S. Korea, Taiwan, Denmark and China. Art residencies have taken him to Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. His works have been displayed in 13 & 17 Asian art biennale (Dhaka, Bangladesh), Chanwong Asian Art Festival 2012 (Chanwong South Korea), Kathmandu Art triennial (Kathmandu, Nepal).
The Ring, Installation with sound, 2017, Kathamandu Triennale
The work of Jupiter Pradhan consists of 5 rings. Instead of a gem, we see faces with different expressions. The artist’s interest in crafts can be understood through the fact that the artist has been talking to people working in different crafts asking them questions about their emotions: happiness, anger,… The sound one hears in the space are the words of the craftsmen expressing their thoughts on their respective emotions. Through this delicate installation, Jupiter Pradhan pays tribute to the people working in different feels but tries also to archive the mental space in which they are working.
Destruction of Gulliver,
Installation, 2017, Trans Studio Project 3.0, Bikalpa Art Center
When I was a child, Gulliver’s stories were my favorites. The giant crosses the seas and visits the land that lies beyond. He discovers other kinds of humans with other kinds of ways and eventually gets tied to the ground by them. As there are many humans, there are many cultures, and sometimes, one culture tries to tie another one to the ground. That’s what happens in Nepal when the traditional culture is under siege and is replaced: traditional puppets turn into little soldiers. The substitution goes with violence. The identity is wounded and the artist falls.
Melting Identity, the socio-cultural & Eco-geological Identity threat
Kathmandu International Art Festival 2012: Earth │Body│Mind)
Medium/Materials: Mix (paraffin wax, plaster of paris, ambulance lights, traditional clay tub (atal), iron, sound etc.)
A human torso melts in the heat like a glacier. Cast with paraffin wax into the form of a candle, placed on a traditional lotus-shaped clay tub, and kept continuously lit during the exhibit, its shape changes day by day, like the shapes of melting Himalayan glaciers. Other torsos hold ambulance lights, a symbol of the emergency situation of global warming and climate change.
This artwork aims to raise awareness of global warming and draw parallels between threats to the earth and threats to the socio-cultural and eco-geological identities of the people who inhabit it.