Rethinking Materiality: Eco Art and Sustainable Architecture

One of India’s leading contemporary artists, Navjot Altaf is a major artistic voice in postcolonial Indian art, her work having been known both nationally and internationally over the last several decades. In her nearly forty -year-long practice, she has worked with painting, sculpture, installation and video. She has a diverse range of collaborators, including artists of rural origin in Bastar, the transgender community, intellectuals, activists, filmmakers, and academics. Through these collaborations, her work speaks expansively and sensitively about the socio-political conditions of the world we find ourselves in, causing one to reflect on the internal and external struggles we face whilst making meaning of our contexts, making her oeuvre resonate in today’s world. She was granted an international award for Public Art Project for her work Nalpar and Pilla Gudi in 2013. Yamuna.Elbe was another public art project by Altaf at the Yamuna in Delhi and the Elbe in Hamburg, Altaf’s work has been exhibited in world renowned institutions, galleries, universities, and biennales in Germany, USA, UK, Switzerland, China, Korea, Belgium, Japan, and Cuba as well as in institutions across India. Her work has been written about and curated by some of the art world’s best, including Geeta Kapur, Ashish Rajadhyaksha, Pooja Sood, Nancy Adajania, Gayatri Sinha and others.

Ratna Gupta is a visual artist who utilises a range of materials to produce her sculptures, including resin, latex, needles, wood and bronze. For her, repetition is sacred. The act of doing, over and over, what has become instinctive, is a way of unearthing new meaning, to mark the passage of time and the metamorphoses of bodies. Many of her sculptural objects, at once strange and familiar, echo this obsession with recurrence and transmutation, though her practice doesn’t suggest a desire for permanence, but instead reaffirms the ephemeral. Her practice is as much about the process of making as in the finished object itself. She has shown in Goa, Mumbai and Delhi as well as internationally in cities like Paris and Brussels. Her last solo show, Everything Is Precious, was in Sakshi Gallery, Mumbai in 2018. ratna@ratnagupta.com

Sajid Wajid Shaikh is a Multidisciplinary artist from Bombay - India. He experiments with shape, color and line to produce bespoke illustration, pattern design, portraiture and typography. He takes inspiration from Music and Fine Art to create unique works, which fuse traditional drawing techniques with digital technology. Sajid's clientele includes Google, Facebook, PayPal, Yahoo, Adidas, Red Bull, Condé Nast to name a few.

Dean D’Cruz, a graduate in architecture, is actively involved both in his profession as well as in academics as a Visiting Faculty in the Goa College of Architecture since 1987. He has conducted numerous workshops and seminars on architecture, planning and the environment in over 20 cities across India as well as in the UK, Denmark, Sweden, Italy and Canada. His works and articles have been published in leading magazines in India and abroad. Supported the Royal Art and Architecture Academy, Stockholm, Oxford Brookes University, UK and PRATT University New York for their architectural and planning programs in Goa. He is a Partner and Principal Architect in MOZAIC DESIGN COMBINE’, a leading design firm based in Goa, involved in Urban Intervention, Architecture, Conservation, Product and Graphic Design. Mozaic strives to provide holistic solutions to its patrons. Our engagement often transcends the boundaries of project briefs and enter the realms of new experiences. We explore prospects of symbiotic growth of our clients with nature and encourage sustainable practices in architecture as well as industrial products. The architectural wing of Mozaic has designed around India over 250 houses, 50 hotels, 30 housing complexes, and about 30 institutions, offices and factories. While most of their projects today are in the area of hospitality, we are also striving to make social impact in the areas of education, health care and micro / eco living. Dean has also been a recipient of numerous awards. He is a member of the State Level Committee to prepare the Regional Plan for Goa 2021. He is twice President of The Communidade of Saligao, working on developmental issues in the village, Ex- Chairman Indian Institute of Architect (IIA) Goa Chapter, Director with Goa Foundation and Green Goa Works, organisations involved in environmental issues and Ex - Design Chair of the Goa College of Architecture.

Abhay Sardesai has been the Editor of ART India, the premier art magazine of India, since November 2002. Under his editorship, the magazine has developed a Culture Studies-oriented approach and has become more inter-disciplinary in its theme-based explorations. He has been a Visiting Faculty in Aesthetics at the Department of English, University of Mumbai, and has also been the Chair of Humanities, Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute of Architecture, Mumbai. He teaches at TISS and the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Mumbai City Museum. He writes in English and translates from Marathi, Konkani and Gujarati. As an associate of the research collective PUKAR, he was the Director of the Writing Across the City project which explored the inter-relationships between literatures and literary cultures in the city of Mumbai. He has written widely on Art and Literature and read from his work at various places including the University of Princeton, University of Cambridge, Mumbai University, S.N.D.T. University and NGMA, among other places.