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PRESS RELEASE

MRINALINI MUKHERJEE: “Palm-Scapes”
Opening on Tuesday,October 29th from 6 to 8pm.
The exhibition continues to Saturday, November 23rd.

Nature Morte is pleased to present an exhibition of new bronze sculptures by the esteemed artist based in New Delhi Mrinalini Mukherjee.
Perhaps India’s preeminent female sculptor working today, Mrinalini Mukherjee has become known for a fearless investigation of materials over a career now entering its fifth decade. She made her mark in the 1970s and 80s with ambitious works of dyed and woven hemp fibers and went on to investigate ceramics and cast bronze. Her most recent body of work takes the bronzes to new levels of technical proficiency and commanding scales.

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Mrinalini Mukherjee: “Palm Scapes”
The sculptural practice of Mrinalini Mukherjee has always been foremost about her materials, and the investigation and exploitation of those materials. From her earliest works using dyed and woven fibre, to hand-modelled ceramics, and then to cast bronzes, in each case the works are true to themselves, only of the singular material, completely dedicated to a fixated expression. The forms Mukherjee creates in these various materials do have a consistency of approach, a recognizable personality, hovering between vegetal and figurative silhouettes, appearing surprisingly fluid in spite of their inert realities.

Bronze has been the artist’s medium of choice for the past ten years, and as her exploration has continued, her forms have become both larger and more complex. The newest group of bronzes will seem familiar to those who saw her previous bodies of work, yet they attain a level of marvel that edges slightly towards the monstrous. Cantilevered, contorted, leaping, and preening, these sculptures seem only slightly perturbed by gravity. They may be fossilized trophies dug from a prehistoric swamp or the robotic armour of an alien orchid creature. They are most certainly the masterpieces of an accomplished sculptor at the very height of her expertise.
Peter Nagy, September 2013