Chitragati / চিত্রগতি is an ongoing collaboration with artist Abu Kalam Shamsuddin. Our first project explores the early nineteenth-century landscape and architectural painter, Sita Ram. In an essay titled “Sita Ram’s Hybrid Paintings of Nineteenth-Century India,” we analyze the way Sita Ram’s paintings respond to their historical moment through an idiosyncratic approach to style and visual narrative, and we investigate how the artist’s work is framed by the western museums where it currently resides. The essay deals with themes of colonialism and visual narrative.
Here is a link to our full essay in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bangladesh titled “Sita Ram’s Hybrid Paintings of Nineteenth-century India” (Vol. 66, No. 2) – https://www.asiaticsociety.org.bd/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Humanities_Dec_2021.pdf
