pushpamala-n-sinful-city

PUSHPAMALA N

“Return of the Phantom Lady” (Sinful City)

About the work:

From 1996 to ’98, Pushpamala created Phantom Lady or Kismet, the artist’s first “photo-performance” work comprised of 25 black-and-white prints. Billed as a Photo Romance and shot in the film noir style, the thriller starred Pushpamala as not only the Phantom Lady but also her doppelganger, the lost twin sister The Vamp. The work acquired a cult status and has been exhibited all over the world, prompting the artist to create its sequel.

In Return, the Phantom Lady gets caught again in a dark web of murder, intrigue, and foul play in contemporary Mumbai. While rescuing an orphaned schoolgirl, the Phantom Lady gets entangled in the underworld and their land grab operations, which stop at nothing. Turning investigator, she tracks the mystery, following and being chased through the principal sites of their evil operations – historical film theatres, shanty businesses, and new glass-faced office blocks. Shot in the film noir style in seductive colour recalling the rich baroque of movie halls, the peeling interiors of dingy offices and slums, and the acid tones of cheap crime thriller covers, the drama unfolds as the city is mapped with layers of cinematic references. Return is about the new Mumbai.

Artist CV

Pushpamala N has been called “the most entertaining artist-iconoclast of contemporary Indian art”. She is known for her sharp and witty feminist work and for her rejection of authenticity and embracing of multiple realities. As one of the pioneers of conceptual art in India and a leading figure in the feminist experiments in subject, material and language, her inventive work in sculpture, conceptual photography, video and performance have had a deep influence on cultural practice in India.Pushpamala’s work has been featured in important Biennales worldwide, such as the Busan Biennale 2016 (S Korea); Forum Expanded, Berlinale, Berlin (Germany) 2016; Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Kochi (India) 2014, Prospect.3 New Orleans (USA) 2014 and the First Johannesburg Biennale (South Africa) 1995; in museum shows at the Tate Modern and Saatchi Art Gallery (London, UK), Centre Pompidou (Paris, France), Seattle Museum, and Art Institute of Chicago (USA), Royal Ontario Museum (Toronto, Canada), Museo Tamayo (Mexico), Kunstmuseum Bern (Switzerland), CaixaForum Barcelona and Institut Valencià d’Art Modern (Spain), MAXXI Museum (Rome, Italy), Mori Art Museum (Tokyo, Japan), National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (South Korea), and National Portrait Gallery, Canberra (Australia), Devi Art Foundation and National Gallery of Modern Art (Delhi )- and in international photography festivals such as Fotofest, Houston; Chobi Mela Dhaka; PhotoEspaña (Madrid, Spain), Delhi Photo Festival; Singapore International Photography Festival; Noorderlicht Photofestival (Netherlands) and Fotofluss ( Austria). Her work has been collected by major museums worldwide. She was recently the Artistic Director and Curator of the Chennai Photo Biennale 2019.