Scentscape in Early Modern India: Materiality and Mobility of Mughal Perfumes
by Amrita Chattopadhyay
Tracing the material production and circulation networks of these high-value aromatics, this essay highlights the ways in which Mughal perfumes came to be valued for their religious and aesthetic sensibilities, and were also deployed for diplomatic exchanges.

Navigating through the History of Indian Textile Trade
by Sanghamitra R. Verman
From Dhaka muslin to Gujarati patola, this essay looks at a range of textiles that travelled from the Indian subcontinent to different parts of the world, especially from the 15th to the 17th century. They set new benchmarks in beauty, functionality and durability, and reflected a close inter

Commercial Rivalry in the Indian Ocean in Ancient Times
by S.L. Malhotra
The essay traces the dynamics established between India and West-Asian and European countries based on trade and commerce across ancient empires and civilizations.

India's Oversea Trade as Known from the Buddhist Canons
by Madan Mohan Singh
The essay locates textual evidence of maritime activities, centres and systems in ancient kingdoms and communities of the Pre-Mauryan and Mauryan period, as recorded in Jataka narratives and the writings of scholars like Panini and Kautilya.

Mir’at al Quds - Father Jerome’s Mirror of Jesuit Piety for the Mughal Kings
by Sama Haq

Visual Language of the Prajnaparamita Manuscript Tradition: Transforming the Text into Icons
by Abira Bhattacharya

Buranji: A Vernacularized Literary Tradition of the Ahom Court
by Nandita Goswami

History, Memory, Time: Writing the Past in 12th-Century Kashmir
by Shonaleeka Kaul

Visualizing Kumar Gandharva’s Restless, Meditative Musicality
by Sucheta Chakraborty
Amit Dutta’s film, Phool Ka Chhand, screened at the 2025 Kala Ghoda Arts Festival in Mumbai, uses a free-associative hand-drawn animation style to capture the ceaselessly improvisatory nature of Kumar Gandharva’s music.

A Camera Pictures Life in and beyond Sudhir Patwardhan’s Canvas
by Sucheta Chakraborty
In Picturing Life, shown at the 2025 Kala Ghoda Arts Festival, Mumbai, director Harshil Bhanushali goes in search of the places and denizens of Bombay/Mumbai that have inspired Patwardhan’s paintings.

Review: The Mehta Boys
by Sachin Sharma
Boman Irani’s directorial debut offers a stylistically fresh and emotionally warm insight into inter-generational conflict, but sticks to the Bollywood trope of a son seeking validation from a father who teaches through tough love.

Un-drunk Waters and Un-seen Urbanities in M.T. Vasudevan Nair’s Cinema
by Shyma P.
The idyllic rural aesthetics of Vasudevan Nair’s films attempt to manoeuvre the Nair life as Malayali life, preserving a timeless feudal order against the threats of urban aspirations and commerce.

V. Shantaram: An Experimental Storyteller and Paragon of Nehruvian Socialism
by Radhika Tulsian
His tryst with the politically aware cinema of Maharashtra Film Company prepared V. Shantaram to combine new technologies of filmmaking with socialist and reformist ideas at the Prabhat Film Company and later at Rajkamal Kalamandir.

Absences, Film History and Neighbourhood Cinemas of Calcutta
by Madhuja Mukherjee
Mukherjee’s research on single-screen cinemas in the city delves into the history of their ownership and viewership, their close association with Bazaar culture, the different forces that led to their decline, and how they continue to haunt various bustling, cosmopolitan urban localities.

Desire and Desiderium: Intergenerational Female Sexuality in Girls Will Be Girls
by Nikhila S.
A look at inter-generational female sexuality in Shuchi Talati’s directorial debut, and the exploration of adolescence in other recent Indie films like Bulbul Can Sing and Hadinelentu.

Locationality and Autoethnography in the Cinema of Northeastern India
by Mukul Haloi
Filmmakers like Haobam Paban Kumar, Dominic Sangma and Rima Das explore identity, memory and belonging, as their films transform personal narratives into acts of resistance and reclamation in strife-torn regions like Manipur, Meghalaya and Assam.

The Art of Zainul Abedin
by Richard Wilson
An archival essay highlighting the oeuvre of Zainul Abedin, known for his contribution to early Indian modernism portraying the sociopolitical turmoil of the 1943 Bengal famine and the Partition.

George K in Conversation with Ravinder Reddy

George K. discusses his Aravani series, on display at the 2024-2025 Bangkok Art Biennale, and his broader practice that engages with alternative gender and sexuality.

The Consensual Hallucination of L.N. Tallur
by Shankar Tripathi
In Tallur’s solo exhibition, Neti-Neti, data is transformed into a colour-coded landscape of bronze and metallic forms, and the glitch that ruptures through traditional figures becomes the new code.

Who Planned the Taj?
by Rev. H. Hosten, S.J.
The writer investigates the planning of the Taj Mahal and considers historical evidence to deduce whether this visual marvel had French or Venetian design origins.

Gandhiji on Art
by Nirmal Kumar Bose
This archival piece revisits an interaction between Nandalal Bose and Mahatma Gandhi to reflect on Gandhi’s meticulous understanding of art, beauty and the role of creative interventions in making meaning in life.

Late Style and Naked Representation in the Works by K.G. Subramanyan
by Parul Dave Mukherji
A self-referential quality and a thinking about images through images dominate a recent exhibition on works produced by Subramanyan during the last decade of his life.

Purvaee: From the East to the Rest
by Radhika Sharma and Radhika Tulsian
This ongoing exhibition at KNMA, Noida, looks at intersecting lives and institutional and artistic associations between the Santiniketan and Baroda art schools in their early years.

The Lie of the Land
by Adip Dutta
This review of Paula Sengupta’s recent exhibition reveals the ways in which she combines her affinity for textiles and printmaking to engage with the many layered histories of riverine Bengal.

Museumizing a Faith: In Conversation with Kevin Fernandes and Natasha Fernandes
by Mrinalini Vasudevan
Through a discussion of the history and the curation of specific objects at the Museum of Christian Art, Goa, Kevin and Natasha provide insights into the strengths and limitations of this institution.

New Kid on the Block: Mumbai’s Museum of Solutions
by Neerja Deodhar
The institution widens the scope of a children’s museum, celebrating modes of learning that find limited space in traditional schooling, and viewing children as agents of change, capable of confronting social and ecological issues.

Museum Making in India Today: Conversation with Eka Resources
by Namrata Ghosh
New and upcoming museums in the country reveal how they incorporate Indian design practices and build on collaborations between local and foreign firms.

Kolkata Police Museum
by Namrata Ghosh
Tracing police history from the colonial to the early 2000s, the museum provides a glimpse into the formation, evolution and functioning of the city police while raising questions about the politics of representing institutional histories.

Interrogating India’s First Museum Biennale at the Bihar Museum
by Namrata Ghosh
The article raises important questions about the use of the word ‘biennale’ while examining the impressive museum the event is located in.

Representing a History of Violence: The Partition Museum in Delhi
by Umara Zainab
The recently inaugurated museum highlights Delhi’s experience of violence and displacement in the wake of the 1947 Partition.

A House for Mr Roy
by Mrinalini Vasudevan
DAG’s recent acquisition of and plans for the Jamini Roy House in Kolkata gives hope for a new model of museum-making in India.

Praying at the Museum: The Ancestral Home of Swami Vivekananda
by Namrata Ghosh
On the eve of Swami Vivekanand’s death anniversary, the author visits his house-museum, which also serves as a place for worship.

And/Or/Both: Kaiwan Mehta's World, But No Home
by Rohan Shivkumar
Mehta turns to the shifting spaces of urban neighbourhoods, bringing together a variety of artworks that engage with the interplay between private and public lives and habits.

Thresholds of Becoming: 16 Artists Try To Step Across
by Sandhya Bordewekar
A recent exhibition at Ahmedabad's Conflictorium Museum delves into the various 'thresholds' that mark artistic practice, urban history and memories of home.

Nation as Exhibit: The Long Shadow of T.N. Mukharji
by Gayatri Sinha
Remembering T N Mukharji, the first Indian curator at an art institution, known for his internationally mounted exhibitions in the 1880s.

Artists and the Weather Station
by Namrata Ghosh and Radhika Sharma
28° North and Parallel Weathers brings together art, science and digital intervention in tracking weather changes in regions along latitude 28° North.

In Search of New Horizons: Muhanned Cader's Island in the Sky
by Mrinalini Vasudevan
The landscapes captured in the Sri Lankan artist's first solo exhibition in India become metaphors for themes of home, belonging, exile and multicultural identities.

Revisiting Another Master: Ram Singh Urveti
by Umara Zainab
The myths and legends of the Gond community have found new life in the painterly canvas of Urveti over the last three decades.

When Artists Reimagined ‘The Waste Land’
by Radhika Sharma
Art Heritage’s exhibition revisits T. S. Eliot’s classic, Reimagining The Waste Land, through the works of five contemporary Indian artists.

Crisis in the Critical Zone
by Namrata Ghosh
This travelling exhibition seeks to draw attention to the ever-growing challenge of climate change by focusing on the fragile environment of the critical zone that sustains all life on Earth.

Devraj Dakoji: The Master Printer
by Lina Vincent
A new retrospective show, Signed, Lower Right: Devraj Dakoji, traces the artist’s training in and experiments with printmaking over the last five decades.

Freeing the Mind
by Avantika Bhuyan
Praneet Soi’s Hold Still is imbued with a lyrical quality and dotted by recurring motifs that transfigure, fragment, and deconstruct the original form. A key aspect of his practice, it is rooted in his experiences in the tumultuous United States of the late ’90s and early ’00s

Home as a Studio
by Sudhir Patwardhan
In his engagement with the notion of the family, spatial connotations of home and its relation with the cityscape, Patwardhan deliberates upon the causes that spurred him to shift his focus from the street to domestic interiors.

The Acumenical Pursuits of Mr. L.N. Tallur
by Peter Nagy
This is an in-depth survey of the style of L.N. Tallur, known for visualizing the convergence of the traditional and the contemporary in diverse forms, while addressing the gap between art and craft in his practice.

In the Forests of the Night
by Jesal Thacker
Tara Sabharwal’s mnemonic works bridge the conscious and the unconscious worlds, while their textural patterns and splurges of colour explore the idea of creation through the lens of the ‘wild’ and the ‘sublime’.

Three Narratives of Displacement
by Gayatri Sinha
A 2007 show of Chittrovanu Mazumdar’s works at 1x1 Art Gallery emphasizes how his practice addresses displacement through an informed hybrid perspective of personal, cultural, and social contexts.

Cracks in the Wall
by Adwait Singh
Ayesha Singh explores intercultural exchange in the pre-globalization world, while drawing attention to the vulnerability and transience of built architecture.

Baaraan Ijlal: Hostile Witness
by Gayatri Sinha
Baaraan Ijlal studies her chosen site as a witness to history and situates it within the context of demolition and repurposing that has gripped Indian cities and their built heritage.

Drifting Threads: Cholamandal Artists’ Village over fifty years
by Ashrafi S Bhagat
Ashrafi Bhagat traces the past, present and future of the Cholamandal Artists' Village in Chennai.

How to Feel a Leak?
by CAMP
CAMP elaborates on their work, THE RADIA TAP(E)S as part of The Ungovernables, New Museum, New York Triennial (2012).

CONA: Points of Reflection
by Hemali Bhuta
Hemali Bhuta on the founding of CONA as a pedagogical structure for artists.

New Group: In conversation with Amitava Das and Mona Rai at New Delhi, April 23, 2014

Amitava Das and Mona talk about the formation of the New Group in 1974.

The Calcutta Group - Its Aims and Achievements
by Prodosh Das Gupta
Prodosh Das Gupta highlights the premise of founding the Calcutta Group in 1940.

Indian Society of Oriental Art
by James H. Cousins

Society of Contemporary Artists, Kolkata, 1960

Calcutta Group, 1943

A Conversation on Caste, Labour and Art with Vikrant Bhise
by Critical Collective
The young Bombay-based artist discusses his engagement with Ambedkar’s teachings and the stories of the Dalit community depicted in his paintings.

Architectures of Momentum: In Conversation with Rameshwar Broota
by Critical Collective
The artist’s oeuvre has been a long-standing testament to how he addresses the passage of time in defined forms and abstractions.

On 1Shanthiroad: In Conversation with Suresh Jayaram
by Mallika Visvanathan
As 1Shanthiroad Studio and Gallery completes 20 years, Suresh Jayaram speaks about the nature of the space and its future in a post-pandemic world.

Conversation with Gigi Scaria
by Sohorpem Kazingmei
The artist highlights the centrality of city landscapes in his work, while speaking of his experiments with printmaking as part of his artistic process.

On Nature and Abstraction: An Interview with Ganesh Haloi
by Namrata Ghosh
The artist talks about how his early life and experiences greatly influenced his practice.

how many songs from a single note?
by Shaunak Mahbubani
Shaunak Mahbubani interviews artist, Rah Naqvi about her recently closed exhibition, how many songs from a single note?

Today is Better than Yesterday: In Conversation with Surekha
by Mallika Visvanathan
Surekha speaks about her recent works displayed at 1Shanthiroad, Bengaluru, made in response to the feelings of stagnation and loss which characterized the first waves of Covid-19.

Pieces of Home: In conversation with Tanmoy Samanta

The artist discusses his latest series of works created in the midst of the pandemic, which reconsider the ideas of home and earthly existence, using pigment, rice paper and shape-shifting collages.

Mumtaz Begum: A Courtesan Who Challenged the Court
by Sachin Sharma
The story of Mumtaz Begum, mistress of Tukoji Rao Holkar, who later became the subject of an infamous legal case and film, reveals the difficult negotiations brokered by women in cinema in early 20th-century India between competing political forces.

Clothes that Make an Indian Female Politician
by Kamayani Sharma
Indian women political leaders use the short haircut and glamorous power sari to enfashion identities that complicate patriarchal and caste mores around femininity.

Between Freedom and Confinement
by Arundhati Bhan
Unseen Shadows, a new exhibition by Richa Arya and Deena Pindoria, delves into narratives of resilience, the limitations of materiality, socio-political erasure, and the undervaluation of women's work.

Queering Frames: In Conversation with Debalina Majumder
by Upasana Das
Majumder opens up about her engagements with the queer community in Bengal and beyond through her photography and films, focusing on contemporary debates around decriminalizing homosexuality and legalizing same-sex marriage in India.

Fluid Bodies, Plastic Trends: Beauty in the Age of Instagram
by Avilasha Ghosh
The ‘fashion beauty complex’ continues to regulate women’s bodies and beauty under the garb of new discourses around self-care, health and body positivity on social media.

Rituparno Ghosh and the Queer Folks of Bengal
by Kaustav Bakshi
A look at how the late Bengali filmmaker emerged as a queer icon by making public a precarious, marginal, dispossessed life.

Conversation with the Aravani Art Project
by Critical Collective
On the use of collaborative public art projects, especially murals, to empower the trans community across small and big cities in India.

Afrah Shafiq and the Art of Play
by Mrinalini Vasudevan
Shafiq, who works at the intersections of technology and art, opens up about the women who have inspired and found their way into her stories.

Anandavardhana's Treatment of Aprastutaprasamsa
by P. K. Narayana Pillai
The essay discusses the degree of novelty in Anandavardhana’s theory of dhvani, and the rhetorician’s opinions regarding the contributions of his successors towards the theorization of dhvani. (1957)

A Critical Survey of the Ancient Indian Theatre Accordance with the Bharata Natyasastha and its Commentators
by Subba Rao
Construction of ancient Indian theatre, as propounded in Bharata's Natyashastra is interpreted in an objective manner by comparing the theoretical with the practical aspects. (1953)

An Outline of Indian Aesthetics
by Nagendra
On the various speculations pertaining to the nature of Beauty in the Indian context and the contribution of Indian poetics and philosophy in its formulation. (1934)

The Dynamism of the Indian Concept of Rasa
by K S Ramaswamy Shastri
On the concept and origin of Rasa in Indian aesthetics and the development of its elements. (1935)

Some Modern Critics and Ancient Texts on the Aesthetic Value of Hindu Images
by N.V. Mallavya
On the aesthetic and iconographical aspects of ancient Indian sculpture as outlined in the Agamas and Shastras. (1942)

Anandavardhana’s Treatment of Pratibha in Relation to Dhvani
by K. Krishnamoorthy
On the concept of Pratibha or creative imagination brought about by the agency of Dhvani. (1950)

Peculiarities in the Alamkara-Section of the Agni-Purana
by Suresh Mohan Bhattacharya
On the unique modes of treatment accorded to Alamkara and its constituent elements in the Agni Purana. (1960)

Studies in Dhvanyaloka, the Adivakya in Dhvanyaloka
by V.A. Ramaswami Sastri
On the importance of dhvani in communicating the essence of emotion inherent in poetry and drama. (1955)

Indian Democracy under Scrutiny
by Virginia Whiles
A review of the Barbican’s exhibition, The Imaginary Institution of India: Art 1975-1998, which features 30 artists’ responses to the postcolonial nation-state’s failed promises of democracy.

Entangled Pasts, 1768-Now: Art, Colonialism and Change
by Deeksha Nath
A recent exhibition at London’s Royal Academy explores the legacies of Britain’s imperial past, and the role art played in shaping narratives of empire, enslavement and resistance.

Memory Fields in the Art of the Global South: A Review
by Gayatri Sinha
Andreas Huyssen's deeply perceptive reading of key artists creates a transnational view of the recollection of trauma and its invocation in contemporary art.

Parvez's performative gestures:The subversion of the capitalist art economy
by Deeksha Nath
The author writes on performance and lens based artist Parvez’s seven month long project in Switzerland questioning the presumptions around audience interaction and the sites of art presentation.

Restless Creations: Adeela Suleman's Art for Social Change
by Virginia Whiles
Virginia Whiles speaks with sculptor Adeela Suleman on her use of found objects and dark humour in her work, as a way of exploring social and ecological violence, tragedy and censorship in Pakistan. (2021)

Positionings
by Salima Hashmi
With Bani Abidi's nomination for the Böttcherstraße prize, Salima Hashmi writes on a generation of Pakistani women artists' work "as a site for mutinous content and personal empowerment.” (2020)

TANTRA: Enlightenment to Revolution
by Virginia Whiles
The author reviews the ongoing exhibition at the British Museum through a ‘socially distanced’ critique, following online talks and exchanges with colleagues. (2020)

Contesting and coalescing voices from Dhaka Art Summit
by Mustafa Zaman
In its 5th edition, DAS invited the voices of different communities, giving them a chance to articulate in their own terms, the legacies of colonial/postcolonial modernity. (2020)

Book Review: Photographing Indian Monuments, 1855-1920
by Arundhati Bhan
Sudeshna Guha’s edited accompaniment to the DAG show of the same name looks at the role photography played in reinforcing and challenging colonial documentation of Indian heritage.

Book Review: The Right to Look
by Sachin Sharma
The book explores the multifaceted nature of Indian photography through a structured examination of how the medium interacts with the body, identity and perception.

Book Review: Photo-Attractions
by Malavika Karlekar
Ajay J. Sinha’s latest book unearths the performance-based collaboration between Indian dancer Ram Gopal and American photographer, Carl Van Vechten.

Book Review: History of Urban Form of India
by Sandhya Bordewekar
Pratyush Shankar's book looks at indigenous models of urban planning that emerged in response to local geographic, historical and socio-economic orientations.

Doing History at a Slant: Remembering the Kasauli Art Centre
by Arushi Vats
A review of Belinder Dhanoa’s Kasauli Art Centre (1976-1991)

Book Review: Postnational Perceptions in Contemporary Art Practice
by Kamayani Sharma
Bindu Bhadana examines the art of Chitra Ganesh, Tejal Shah and Nikhil Chopra.

Review of The Planetary King: Humayun Padshah
by Umara Zainab
Ebba Koch's new work provides a holistic picture of the oft-maligned Mughal emperor, Humayun, through a study of his interest, beliefs, ideology and cultural contributions.

Pushpamala N. and "the Artistic Ways of Viewing the Sacred"
by Annapurna Garimella
The book is a collection of articles reflecting on Pushpamala N.’s reimagination of popular images within the framework of nationalism and motherhood.

Ismat Chughtai’s Lihaaf, through Bhasha Chakrabarti’s Gaze
by Neerja Deodhar
Chakrabarti’s latest show, Karvat, brings together her long fascination with the iconic Urdu story about queer desire, and her own engagement with cloth and lovers in domestic settings.

Where Durga Masquerades as Empress Victoria
by Tapati Guha-Thakurta
In a perceptive reading of a 2024 puja pandal, Tapati Guha-Thakurta provides a close study of the colonial and postcolonial statuary against the changing socio-political milieu of Kolkata.

Sahmat: Moments in Collapse
by Umara Zainab
The exhibition is an urgent intervention for critical thought, an exercise in remembering and creating a distinct point and space to force us to imagine a different future.

Karbala and Other Symbols-M.F. Husain
by Gayatri Sinha
Husain's Karbala, bearing its message of persecution and painted during the Gulf War returns with extraordinary prescience, in its staging at the Venice biennale.

Imagining Liminality: The Flux at India’s Cultural Thresholds
by Neerja Deodhar
The unsaid and the hidden-across architecture, history and time-assume centre stage at an exhibition hosted by Mumbai’s Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre.

Lipstick Stories: ‘Middle-Class’ India Gazes at Itself
by Neerja Deodhar
Roshan Chhabria’s latest solo show employs observational humour and a kitschy style toreflect on the common man’s aspirations and insecurities.

A Centenary Tribute to K.G. Subramanyan
by Vasudha Chatterjee
Remembering one of 20th-century India's most prolific and prominent modernists, who was a renowned artist, writer, teacher and institution builder.

Ameen Sayani (1932-2024): The South Asian Radio Star
by Vebhuti Duggal
The essay looks back at Ameen Sayani's stardom in light of his passing, and about the legacies of his flagship programme, Binaca Geetmala.