EMERGING ARTIST AWARD 2013 | KARTIK SOOD

Kartik Sood was chosen as the recipient of the Emerging Artist Award for 2013 by a jury included artist Riyas Komu, curators Susan Hapgood of Mumbai Art Room and Oliver Kielmayer from Switzerland, and Chandrika Grover of Pro Helvetia - Swiss Arts Council, New Delhi. The jury was impressed with the distinct visual quality of Sood's works which have been developed as stories, sometimes autobiographical but always with strong literary references, subtly coloured, layered and painterly. His video works dealing with issues of trauma and mysticism was acknowledged for its narrative form and mature handling of the subject without the burden of conspicuous metaphors. Sood's commitment to experimenting with new technologies and possibilities of sound came across as bold and confident.

A preoccupation in Sood's work is the conflict between material sensibility and a nostalgia for an old way of life. In his project titled Re-birth, which is partly based on a news story,  he pits certain ritualistic practices against the cynicism of modern life. On the one hand, he tries to capture the sense of "an entity within us which is uncertain and doubtful and yet so full of longing." And on the other hand, he presents us with modern man's "conviction in material structures, denial of inner being and gratification of physical desires." Together these form a narrative of modern life full of conflict and shifting imagery.

Sood has done his BFA in Painting from College of Art, New Delhi, and his MFA in Painting from Faculty of Fine Arts, MS University of Baroda. He has participated in exhibitions such as Matters of Importance (2013), Sakshi Gallery, Mumbai; Art Gwangju (2012); In You is the Illusion of Each Day, curated by Maya Kovskaya (2011), Latitude 28, New Delhi, Turn the Tables (2010), Gallery Art Alive, Delhi, among others. Sood lives and works in Vadodara.