Shrine Empire Gallery

Artists

Neerja Kothari

Bio CV Exhibitions

Trepid Traces (6750)

Education:

2013 Master of Fine Arts, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston/Tufts University, USA

2011 Studio Diploma Certificate Program, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, USA

2010 Post-Baccalaureate Certificate Program in Fine Arts, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, USA

2002 Bachelor of Commerce (Honors), Calcutta University, Kolkata, India Artist in Residence:

2018 Ucross Foundation, Wyoming

2016 Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, New Mexico

2016 The Corporation of Yaddo, Saratoga Springs, New York

2015 La Napoule Art Foundation, France

2014 The MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, New Hampshire 2014 Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Virginia

2013 Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, Vermont

Solo Exhibitions:

2021

“Keeping Score,” Shrine Empire, New Delhi, India

Group Exhibitions:

2024

Delhi Contemporary Art Week, Bikaner House, New Delhi

Tribulations and Turbulence...of the body and mind, curated by Rahul Kumar, Blueprint.12, New Delhi

Art Dubai, Shrine Empire, Dubai, UAE

2023

Art Mumbai, Shrine Empire, Maharashtra, India

Conjunction of the Stars, curated by Girish Shahane, Delhi Contemporary Art Week,Bikaner House, New Delhi

India Art Fair, Shrine Empire, New Delhi, India

2022

Kochi-Muziris Biennale, curated by Shubigi Rao, December 12th, 2022 – April 10th, 2023

India Art Fair, Shrine Empire, New Delhi, India

Simulacrum, Curated by Arushi Vats, Anant Art, Bikaner House, New Delhi, India

2021

Hub India at Artissima, Turin, Italy

Delhi Contemporary Art Week, Shrine Empire, New Delhi, India

2020

India Art Fair, Shrine Empire, New Delhi, India

2019

India Art Fair, Shrine Empire, New Delhi, India

Delhi Contemporary Art Week, Shrine Empire, New Delhi

2018

Caressing History, Prameya Art Foundation, Shrine Empire, New Delhi

Lapses II, Sakshi Gallery and Shrine Empire, Mumbai

India Art Fair, Shrine Empire, New Delhi

Delhi Contemporary Art Week, Shrine Empire, New Delhi, India

2017

Delhi Contemporary Art Week, Shrine Empire, New Delhi, India

Lapses, Shrine Empire at The Harrington Street Art Center, Kolkata 2017 India Art Fair, New Delhi, India

2016

India Art Fair, Shrine Empire, New Delhi, India

2013

Drawing Connections: 23rd Drawing Show, Mills Gallery, Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA

en(countering) impossibilities, MFA Thesis Exhibition, Fourth Wall Gallery,Boston,MA

Graduating Students + Award Recipients, SMFA

Deciphering Identity, Jewett Art Gallery, Wellesley College, MA

Pieces Apart: Quantifying Experience, Huret & Spector Gallery, Boston, MA

2012

Invited to assist as a drafter for the Sol LeWitt Wall drawing #118, Something along those lines, Grossman Gallery, SMFA, Boston, MA 2012 Museum Council Summer Party Juried Auction, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA

SMFA Medal Award Gala and Juried Auction, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA

Proof of Purchase, Samson Projects Gallery, Boston, MA

Violence Transformed 2012: The Artist’s Voice, Resnikoff Gallery, Boston,MA 2012 Annual Juried Drawing Show, SMFA, Boston, MA

Awards/Nominations:

2017

Aparajita You Shine Art award, Kolkata, India 2016 FID Prize (Nominee)

2013

Montague International Travel Grant

Nominated (Finalist) for Blance E Colman Award, Boston

Dana Pond Award in Painting (Honorable mention) SMFA, Boston

2011

Scholarship, MFA Program, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Award winner, Annual Juried Drawing Show, SMFA, Boston

Scholarship, Post-Baccalaureate Program, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Bibliography:

2017

The strange ways of memory, Soumitra Das, Telegraph Kolkata, India https://www.telegraphindia.com/1170603/jsp/opinion/story_154794.jsp

2016

The tiny dancer, Melissa Woods, PEM Connected, MA http://connected.pem.org/tiny-dancer/

2014

365artists365days project, featured artist, December 6 2014 2014 New American Paintings #110 NE

Manifest International Drawing Annual INDA 8

Collections:

Devi Art Foundation, India

Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, India

Neerja Kothari (b.1980) is an artist currently living and working from Kolkata, India. She holds an MFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston/Tufts University, USA. Neerja’s work deals with the investigation of the absurd. It’s an attempt at trying to quantify an unquantifiable experience. This is inspired by the time spent in physical rehabilitation recovering from motor sensory neuropathy. Every movement that the brain forgot had to be relearned. The process was slow and fragmented. Every movement was broken down to its smallest bit. And then bit by bit the bigger ideas were formulated. The work then emerges as an investigation of larger existential questions. Derived from multiple instances and memories the work becomes an accumulation of time, labor, process, memories, marks and numbers. Therefore the work is at a point where a lived experience is being translated, explored and represented. There is a struggle to find that mode of representation, a search for a new code or new language of quantifying the unquantifiable; emotional memories in contrast to the muscle memory that had to be restored.

Some of her selected exhibitions include Art Dubai with Shrine Empire (2024); Kochi-Muziris Biennale, curated by Shubigi Rao, India (2022-23); Simulacrum, Curated by Arushi Vats, Anant Art, Bikaner House, New Delhi, India (2022 ); Keeping Score, Solo show, Shrine Empire, New Delhi, India (2021); Hub India at Artissima, Turin, Italy (2021); Caressing History, Prameya Art Foundation, New Delhi, India (2018); Lapses II, Sakshi Gallery and Shrine Empire, Mumbai, India (2018); 2017 Lapses, Shrine Empire at The Harrington Street Art Center, Kolkata, India (2017); Drawing Connections: 23rd Drawing Show, Mills Gallery, Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, Massachusetts, USA (2013); en(countering) impossibilities, MFA Thesis Exhibition, Fourth Wall Gallery,Boston, Massachusetts, USA (2013); Deciphering Identity, Jewett Art Gallery, Wellesley College, Massachusetts, USA (2013); Pieces Apart: Quantifying Experience, Huret & Spector Gallery, Boston, Massachusetts, USA (2013); SMFA Medal Award Gala and Juried Auction, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts, USA (2012).

Neerja’s work has been published in the New American Paintings (NE#110) journal and the Manifest International Drawing Annual INDA8.

She has been awarded fellowships at the Ucross Foundation, Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, the Corporation of Yaddo, MacDowell Colony, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Vermont Studio Center and the La Napoule Art Foundation. Neerja was the recipient of the Montague International Travel Grant (2013) and the Dana Pond Award in Painting (Honorable mention) SMFA, Boston (2013). She was also nominated as a finalist for the Blance E Colman Award, Boston (2013). Her works are in the collections of Goldman Sachs, Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, Devi Art Foundation, amongst others.