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| Anujan Ezhikode |
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Anujan Ezhikode
Web: www.anujanezhikode.com |
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ARTIST STATEMENT
My art begins with the unearthing of a memory. Once found that illuminates my artistic thinking. My images are composed of very basic elements but represent the essential parts of life…energy, growth, and full foliage are all part of the cyclical nature that interests me. Each glimpse of a memory also has a life cycle. We look back, we can see how one moment grows, then gets reinterpreted, and goes through the cycle again. This "life cycle" brings out the process of connections.
My goal is to fuse these memories and art into one, each indistinguishable from the other. In my leaf series, the work shows the physical changes to the leaves and also the changes to the painted images, over time. As they dried and shrank, the work itself created a new layer of memories. Whether using banana leaves or other organic material or forms in my art, it is about the connection, it is about the life cycle, decay, memory, and the present. My work attempts to capture this passage of time, while reinterpreting that familiar place which overtime can't help but be altered and reimagined. As the past unwinds, there is a longing to reconnect. Connections once broken become retied and memories long hidden resurface. Color, images, and time all intersect with an absence of boundaries. |
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| BIO |
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Anujan Ezhikode was born and raised in Kerala, India. His earliest influences were Indian temple arts, folk and religious rituals, and classical music and dance. These early experiences were further augmented by his training in the classical theater arts at the Kerala State Academy of Arts (the Kerala Kalamandalam). This rich artistic lineage of sound and color still fuels his art.
Some opportunities that helped grow his artistic aesthetic in the US were a "Diverse Forms Artists Projects Regional Initiative Grant", a "Project Studio Program Residency at Painting Space 122", an installation for the "Mid-Manhattan library Art in Windows series" and a "Manhattan Graphics Center Fall Printmaking Scholarship".
More recently, he was invited to be one of six artists whose work and words were featured in an audio, video, and live presentation for the National Day of Listening at the NYPL on Fifth Avenue. He had a solo show "Journey Through Broken Bubbles" at the UUFH Gallery in Huntington, NY and he was the featured artist at the Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition's show "Lineage" where he presented an installation, print and painting project, "Transparent Space". Among the many exhibits he participated in 2011 were the Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition's show "Wide Open 2" juried by Nathan Trotman, curator, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and the Newark Annual Arts Festival's Invitational Artist Exhibition Ironbound Unbound #2.
Some exhibition highlights from 2012, include his participation in the Indo-American Arts Council's , 9th Annual Erasing Borders, touring exhibition, his selection for the Amulets, Nazars & Evil Eyes as part of Queen's College's international exhibit for the Year of Turkey and his work's inclusion at the GE Corporate galleries Asian Pacific American Forum in Fairfield, Connecticut. In addition, Anujan was invited to create a site specific installation for the inaugural show at the Prospect St. Fire House Cultural Center in Newark, New Jersey as part of the Newark Arts Council's Open Doors 2012 and Ironbound Unbound #3.
He has exhibited widely at museums, galleries, universities, and libraries among them the Queens Museum of Art, Islip Art Museum, the Hammond Museum, JCAL, the Aicon Gallery, he Crossing Art Gallery, the Twelve Gates Art Gallery in Philadelphia, the Visual Arts Center of New Jersey, and the galleries at University of Connecticut, Penn College, and Stony Brook University. |
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