Overview
Shaurya Kumar is an artist of recollection who immerses himself in memoirs and imagery of history, context and time, who works in shadows of memory and pulls up fallen and forgotten objects, even if temporarily. He is an avid collector of memories and an observer of frameworks. Employing diverse sets of tools, media, techniques and processes including print, drawing, sculpture and installation, his studio practice focuses on a phenomenological understanding of an object and space, while revealing a labour-intensive process in art-making. Indicating notions of presence and absence, these works play with architectural ruins, transient ephemera, and contextual displacements.
Much as the poet Meer Taqi Meer in the 18th century lamented the monumental loss of culture, shift of power and ruination of his home – Delhi, Shaurya echoes the same sentiment in the 21st century. The moments seem to reverberate with the echos of the past. Speaking from the point of view of a citizen, the work reflects on a place, a city, a state, a country that was once a thriving cultural hub, which has now fallen into ruin.
Shaurya Kumar a native of Delhi, India, currently lives and works in Chicago, IL He is an Associate Professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Chair of the Department of Printmedia. Kumar has been involved in numerous prestigious research projects, like “The Paintings of India” and “Handmade in India.” His work has been exhibited widely across the US and abroad including venues like Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum, Mumbai and Seoul Museum, Seoul; Queens Museum, NYC, Aicon gallery, New York.
Shaurya Kumar-The Case of Broken Hands-40 sculptures-ABS (Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene)-size variable-2021
Shaurya Kumar-I am a citizen of that ruined place-porcelain-size variable-2019
Shaurya Kumar, That ruined place, Gold-leaf, soot on Kitakata Paper, 52” x 36", 2018
Shaurya Kumar-In a Sacred Land a Traveler…-Gold leaf and reduction drawing on Rives BFK-14”x19”-2018
Shaurya Kumar, Chausar
Note
The work speaks from the point of view of the citizen while drawing on ethnography, formal analysis of cultural objects and archival study, which are then incorporated into a broader comparative framework.
Biography
Born(1979) in Delhi, India, Kumar began his artistic training in painting and printmaking at the College of Art in Delhi, where he developed an early interest in traditional techniques and material culture. This foundation eventually led him to the United States, where he earned his MFA in Studio Art from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, in 2007. His move marked a pivotal shift in his practice, expanding beyond conventional forms into the realms of digital media, installation, and interdisciplinary research.
His work has been exhibited internationally in museums, galleries, and cultural institutions across India, the United States, and countries including China, South Korea, Thailand, Italy, the United Kingdom, Belgium, Poland, Bulgaria, Norway, France, Australia, and Finland. Some notable venues include the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum in Mumbai, the Queens Museum in New York, the Seoul Museum of Art, Sundaram Tagore Gallery in New York, the South Asia Institute in Chicago, Gallery Threshold in New Delhi, Lakeeren Contemporary in Mumbai, Guanlan Printmaking Base in China, and international art fairs in Delhi, Mumbai, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Hong Kong, Poland, and Singapore.
Kumar currently lives and works in Chicago, where he is Professor of Printmedia at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is currently serving as Chair of Faculty.
One of his recent major exhibitions, Living Without the Gods (2025, South Asia Institute, Chicago), brought together a body of work that reflected on iconoclasm and the afterlife of sacred artifacts. Through installations and mixed-media pieces, Kumar explored how religious and cultural objects acquire new meanings or lose their original significance when removed from their spiritual contexts and placed into secular, often Western, collections. These works offer a meditation on absence, fragmentation, and the violence embedded in cultural displacement.
