Manish Modi

How have your work and your creative process evolved since your years in college, in terms of both influences and output?

I was doing collages using various print media like newspapers and magazines in my college days which reached a saturation point, creating a block in my creative process. So instead of using material directly for surface building, I started painting the entire text which offered...

How have your work and your creative process evolved since your years in college, in terms of both influences and output?

I was doing collages using various print media like newspapers and magazines in my college days which reached a saturation point, creating a block in my creative process. So instead of using material directly for surface building, I started painting the entire text which offered more control over the content and a kind of ritualistic satisfaction from the process. More recently I have been interested in the juxtaposition and superimposition of photographs and texts from various periods of history that pushes the limits of familiarity of these images leading the viewer to a new abstract reality.

Text plays an important role in your paintings, particularly in the context of the newspaper. Can you speak a little about this element of your work?

My father was a newspaper dealer in my home town. Since my childhood, I used to be constantly surrounded by newspapers and this left a mark in my personality and therefore you see it in my works.

In many of your paintings, you draw on archived images and historic figures like Gandhi. What meaning do these elements add to your canvases and what do you wish to convey to your viewer through them?

These historical public figures or icons are just not people but also represent schools of thoughts and beliefs that have given and are still giving shape to our personal, social and political consciousness. Media plays a large role in constructing and deconstructing their image and what they represent, therefore my visual reference of them would always be mediatic. My strategy is to juxtapose and superimpose these visual references that sometimes are equal and opposite that generates irony and pathos. For example, an image of Elvis Presley, who wanted to join the army and became a famous rockstar instead, stands next to an image that refers to the death of Che Guvara, a real life fighter whose portraits we find on t-shirts of rock stars.

Can you tell us a little about the directions in which your creative practice is currently heading? What are some of the projects you are currently working on?

Apart from my paintings on canvas I am also experimenting with various surfaces of antique furniture and found materials that can provide further extensions to my painting process.