Images below: details from three of the paintings.
Art
East Meets West:
Singh Twins Tarot Cards
NEWS REPORT
An exhibition titled, The Art of Tarot: New Work by The Singh Twins, presents the major arcane of Tarot images from a fresh artistic perspective that reflects the eclectic, east/west style for which the renowned Sikh-Briton artists popularly known as The Singh Twins - Rabindra and Amrit Kaur Singh - are celebrated around the world.
Drawing on the text of Dr. Roopa Patel - which also constitutes a book, along with the specially commisioned paintings by the Singh Twins for this purpose - the artists represent the Rider-Waite tradition (probably one of the most well known Tarot decks in the western world) through a modern development of the subcontinental miniature whilst incorporating additional imagery inspired by floral, gem, planetary and zodiac symbolism associated with each of the Tarot’s depicted.
The Art of Tarot: New Work by The Singh Twins, will be launched first at Sakshi Gallery in Mumbai, India, on 4 October (where it will run for one week) and then at the British Council, Delhi, on 19 October where it will run until 4 November 2011.
The exhibitions will be accompanied by an outreach program of talks and events, and specially created ‘Roopa Patel-Singh Twins‟, boxed Tarot cards.
Speaking about the project and their exhibition The Singh Twins say:
“It‟s wonderful to be involved in a collaboration which not only demonstrates developing Indo-British relations in a positive and creative way but which presents further opportunity for us to promote something we have been proud to support as ongoing Ambassadors for our home city of Liverpool‟s Decade of Health and Wellbeing - namely, the interconnection between art and science and the importance of art to health and wellbeing”.
“As artists who knew little about the Tarot tradition before embarking on the project it‟s been a challenging but fascinating and rewarding experience. It‟s given us a better understanding and new appreciation of both the science of Tarot and its history of iconography which we would definitely like to return to in future work”.
“When creating the paintings, our aim was to present a fresh representation of Tarot art. Something unique, that reflected our ongoing interest in global symbolism, the Indian miniature aesthetic and our east-west background, but which also remained as true as possible to the Rider-Waite tradition in terms of iconography and meaning”.
MUMBAI
The EXHIBITION will be open to the public at Sakshi Gallery from Wednesday, 5 October - Monday, 10 October, 2011.
DELHI
The EXHIBITION will be open to the public at the British Council from Thursday, 20 October - Friday, 4 November, 2011
September 28, 2011
Conversation about this article
1: Baldev Singh (Bradford, United Kingdom), September 28, 2011, 10:22 AM.
The power of superstition over faith is and has always been overriding, with religions having the devil, demons and spirits at their core and societies with their 'mumbo jumbo' and 'what the cards have in store for you', as a way of 'forecasting' the future. Fortunately, we Sikhs have been spared all of it. Enjoyed the Twins' rendition of the cards, nevertheless, as art.