exhibition

Flight

Balraj Khanna

02.Apr.04 - 16.May.04
Wed-Sun 12-6 or by appt

Contemporary Art Projects
20 Rivington St
London EC2A 3DU
020 7739 1743
info@caprojects.com
www.caprojects.com
Tube Old Street, Liverpool Street, Shoreditch / Hoxton

Fosterart is pleased to host this long-awaited exhibition of works by Balraj Khanna, critically acclaimed Indian-born artist, curator, and writer. He has exhibited extensively in the UK and abroad over the past forty years in private and public galleries, including Richard Demarco Gallery, Serpentine Gallery, Royal Festival Hall, Hayward Gallery, Arnolfini and Ashmolean Museum.

Khanna's most celebrated painting is the safety curtain of the Birmingham Hippodrome
Theatre. This work, executed in dazzling colours, is the centrepiece of a £30 million
redevelopment project. Completed in 2001 and spanning 26 x 40 feet, it is the largest piece of public art in a theatre in the UK and makes a profound statement of joy, harmony, and balance.

According to the late critic Bryan Robertson, "Mr. Khanna is one of the most distinguished artists working in England whose work should be assessed at roughly the same level of achievement as Davie, Ayres, or Hoyland". This first commercial exhibition in nearly ten years will be a unique opportunity to view and acquire important works by an artist represented in many leading national and international public collections.

Richard Cork: "His work evokes the spirit of a festival where clusters of forms float in a dreamy, gravity-free region. Although the shapes are impossible to pin down, they remain full of individualised character. Some even seem to roar and snap at each other, but in general their mood remains gentle and soothed by a feeling of sensuous fulfilment. A resilient desire to celebrate is the unifying force at work."

Mel Gooding: "The extreme freedom and purity of the figurations in Khanna's paintings, the exhilarating rhythms of their restless play across surfaces and into depths of aerial and marine colour and light, are subject to no pictorial laws, regularities or precedents. The unpredictably elusive forms, part organic, part device-like, are accompanied by ghostly shadows as vivid and insubstantial as retinal after-images."

Balraj Khanna's career has been characterised by an unwavering principle that art should be for everyone a calming and uplifting experience. Through his magical shapes and luminous colours, Khanna offers the viewer "spiritual refreshment" and "a delightful visual feast".

We are delighted that Laura Gasgoigne, noted contemporary art critic, will be joining us for an evening during the exhibition to have a conversation with Balraj about his work, influences, and the importance of contemporary art in today's society.