Sonia Mehra Chawla
Born in Kolkata, West Bengal, India, Sonia Mehra Chawla received her Bachelor’s Degree in Fine Arts in 2001, and Masters Degree in Fine Arts in 2004 from College of Art, New Delhi, India. Sonia's works are an ongoing debate between the individual and the constantly changing urban locations. Her works deal with ideas of emergence, fragility, transience, decadence and dissolution. The forms carry within themselves the vitality of the living and the vulnerability of decay. Destruction and evolution are the two conceptual devices that Sonia uses in her works to exemplify her visual concerns. And even though she provides an apocalyptic view of mindless urbanization, the works strike a positive note by investing energies in articulating the concept of genesis, growth, existence and survival, an eternal process she ceaselessly stresses on. Her works span across several media like photography, painting, fine art printmaking, video and installation.

Visual artist & researcher

Fellow, Akademie Schloss Solitude, Germany. Art, Science & Business Program

Creative Scotland and Marine Scotland Fellowship Grantee 2018-21

Khoj International Artists Association & Wellcome Trust UK/ DBT India Fellow for Art & Science 2017-19

British Council India and Charles Wallace India Trust (CWIT) Scholar to the United Kingdom 2014-15

 

RECENT & ONGOING PROJECTS 

'Entanglements of Time & Tide', an art-science engagement project supported by Edinburgh Printmakers, Marine Scotland, Creative Scotland, Marine Laboratory Scottish Government and ASCUS Art & Science Edinburgh. (2018-ongoing)

'Elementary', Edinburgh International Science Festival 2020.

'Earth Gardens', Akademie Schloss Solitude, Germany. (2019-ongoing)

'The Undivided Mind', Art+Science, Khoj International Artists' Association + Wellcome Trust UK/DBT India Alliance. (2018)

'For An Image Faster Than Light', Yinchuan Biennale 2016, curated by Bose Krishnamachari, Museum of Contemporary Art, Yinchuan, China.

'Critical Membrane', solo project, Exhibit 320, New Delhi. Curatorial Adviser: Ranjit Hoskote. Research support: MSSRF India. (2017)

Eine Welt in der Stadt, 'A World In The City: Zoological and Botanic Gardens', curated by Kaiwan Mehta, Institut Fur Auslandsbeziehungen, Institute For Foreign Cultural Relations, Stuttgart, Germany.(2017)

'On Slippery Grounds' , video art from India,  ET4U Contemporary Visual Arts Projects, Denmark. (2017)

'Planes of Action, Zones of Experience', part of the Architecture Section of Kala Ghoda Festival that was curated by Kaiwan Mehta, Ranjit Hoskote & Rahul Mehrotra, Gallery MMB, Goethe Institut, Max Mueller Bhavan, Mumbai. (2017)

'Ein Baum Ist, Ein Baum Ist Ein Baum: A Tree Is A Tree Is A Tree' ,curated by Dr Prof. Herwig Guratzch, Beck & Eggeling Galleries, Dusseldorf, Germany. 

 

PUBLICATIONS  2016-2020

MARG publication on Art & Ecology, edited by Ravi Agarwal & Latika Gupta. Feature essay:'Solastalgia, the Anthropocene in Indian Contemporary Art', a comprehensive essay by Maya Kovskaya. 

'Hence (UN) Proven: Reflections on Art and Science', published by Khoj Inernational Artists' Association + Wellcome Trust UK/ DBT India Alliance. (2018)

'For An Image Faster Than Light', The publication of Yinchuan Biennale 2016, curated by Bose Krishnamachari. Published in 2017 by the Yinchuan Museum of Contemporary Art, China.

Eine Welt in der Stadt, 'A World In The City: Zoological and Botanic Gardens', published by Institut Fur Auslansbeziehungen IFA,Germany.

'Some things that only Art can do: A Lexicon of Affective Knowledge', Edited by Nancy Adajania, published by The Raza Foundation.

 

EVENTS/LECTURES/PRESENTATIONS  2016-2020

2019: 'Fragile Membranes/Productive Crossings',lecture presentation, Marine Scotland Seminar Series 2019-20, Marine Laboratory of the Scottish Government, Aberdeen.

2018: 'Material and Discursive Possibilities in the Framing of Art & Science', lecture presentation by Mehra Chawla at 'IIT Cognitalks', IIT Gandhinagar, Gujarat, India.

2017: Artists' Talk with Sonia Mehra Chawla and gallery walk through with Andrea Weltz, on the occassion of IFA'S 100th Anniversary, Institut Fur Auslansbeziehungen, ifa Gallery Stuttgart, Germany.

2016: International Conference & seminar, Ist Yinchuan Biennale China.

2016: 'Eco Artists: Chronicling India's Environmental Concerns Through Diverse Art Forms', Kala Ghoda Literature Festival panel discussion with Ravi Agarwal, Sonia Mehra Chawla, Arati Rao & Meera Subramanian.

2015: The Charles Wallace India Trust Seminar with CWIT Awardees, Bose Krishnamachari, Anupam Sah & Sonia Mehra Chawla, British Council Mumbai.