Subodh Gupta, The Idol Thief

Experimenting on a variety of media, Subodh Gupta is best known for his monumental & sculptural works composed of everyday metal objects like lunch boxes, tin cans, and cookware. Describing himself as a representative of cultural history and the ‘idol thief’, his work translates a spiritual quality through the items from which they are composed. Subodh Gupta is one of the most exciting and audacious contemporary artists to have emerged in recent years. The works of Subodh Gupta, an alumnus of the College of Arts, Patna encompasses sculpture, installation, painting, photography, performance, and video. He is best known for incorporating everyday objects that are ubiquitous throughout India, such as the steel tiffin boxes used by millions to carry their lunch as well as thali pans, bicycles, and milk pails. From such ordinary items, the artist produces sculptures that reflect the economic transformation of his homeland and which relate to Gupta’s own life and memories. Gupta’s strategy of appropriating everyday objects and turning them into artworks that dissolve their former meaning and function brings him close to artists like Duchamp.
Gupta transforms the icons of Indian everyday life into artworks that are readable globally. He is among a generation of young Indian artists whose commentary tells of a country on the move, fuelled by boiling economic growth and a more materialistic mindset. The Guardian called him ‘the Damien Hirst of Delhi. He succeeds in finding an art language that references India and at the same time can be appreciated for its aesthetic throughout the world; as Gupta says: ‘Art language is the same all over the world, which allows me to be anywhere.
One of his famous works, consisting of Indian cooking utensils, is ‘line of control’ (2008) a colossal mushroom cloud constructed entirely of pots and pans. The gigantic installation is made of stainless utensils. The phrase ‘line of control’ is invariably used to denote contested borders between disputed territories world over. Subodh Gupta’s work is indeed illuminating. The work was shown in the Tate Triennial at Tate Britain in 2009 and is currently exhibited at the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art in Delhi.

Selected Works

My Mother and Me, 1997
Gupta set himself apart from others of his generation by adopting organic materials most notably cow dung. ‘My Mother and Me’ was a cylindrical structure ten feet high made from cowpats with a layer of ash spread across the floor.

Bihari, 1999
Gupta addressed his identity and rural roots through a self-portrait enmeshed in cow dung and a single LED-inscribed Devanagiri word, “Bihari,” meaning someone from Bihar.

Very Hungry God, 2006
In 2007, this monumental skull composed of gleaming stainless steel vessels was displayed outside François Pinault’s Palazzo Grassi, at the 2007 Venice Biennale. The French Billionaire had acquired the work that was displayed around the same time as Damien Hirst’s diamond-encrusted skull For the Love of God at White Cube.

What does the vessel contain, that the river does not, 2012
Originally created for the first edition of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Gupta’s poetically titled 21.35m long, 3.15m wide, 110 cm deep boat was stuffed with an assemblage of miscellaneous found objects; abandoned chairs, beds, fishing nets, window frames, etc. Echoing sentiments of migration, displacement, belonging, movement, and stability, the work derives its title from a line in Rumi’s “The Sufi Path of Love”.