Artist Biography
Hema Upadhyay (1972–2015, Baroda India, based in Mumbai, India) worked across photography, painting and installation to explore notions of history, power, identity, gender, socioeconomics and dislocation, especially within her native India. She often drew from personal experiences to reflect on the tensions that exist within urban cities like Mumbai, such as growth and decay, wealth and poverty, desire and fear.
Upadhyay’s notable mixed-media installations often feature found objects, which she manipulated and recomposed into sprawling and intricate spatial arrangements. They convey stories of city life that teeter between real and imagined. In 8’ x 12’ (2009), visitors are invited to enter a tight 8-foot by 12-foot interior—the average size of a slum house in the shantytown of Dharavi, Mumbai. Its walls and ceiling are densely covered in miniature dwellings made from scrap metals, tarpaulin and other found material, presenting an aerial slum view that evokes both the fragility and resilience of human survival.
Upadhyay obtained her BFA in Painting and MFA in Printmaking from Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda in 1995 and 1997 respectively. Notable solo exhibitions include Modernization (2013), Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati; Mute Migration (2013), Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney; Hema Hpadhyay (2013), Museum and Gallery of the Northern Territory, Darwin; The Indian Highway (2013), The Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing; Where the Bees Suck, There Suck I (2009), Museo d’Arte Contemporanea di Roma; and The Nymph and the Adult (2001), Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane. The artist has also participated in major international festivals including All The World’s Futures (2015), 56th Venice Biennale; Whorled Explorations (2014), 2nd Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Kochi; Arts and Cities (2010), 1st Aichi Triennale, Nagoya; and Parallel Realities (2005), 3rd Fukuoka Asian Art Triennale.
Upadhyay had her residency at the STPI Workshop in 2008, resulting in the exhibition Universe Revolves On (2008).
