Explore Schon Mendes’ Cameos Of A City

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Anyone who’s lived in a metropolis will know how the extraordinary coexists with the mundane, how the private and the public merge, and how the individual and the collective survive together. In his debut solo show, Baroda-based artist Schon Mendes explores the contrasts and similarities of urban Indian cities. The vibrant large-format paintings fuse moments, situations and interactions of the metro capturing the joys, sorrows and vulnerabilities of city life. The exhibition gives viewers a chance to revisit the bustling lanes of the metropolitan India we all know, through Mendes’ eyes.

5 Questions with the artist, Schon Mendes

1. Artistic Motivations: “The Indian city as we know it today is  a place forever teeming with human energies and activity; energies of different kinds, frequencies and intensities that form a crescendo that is deafening yet riveting at all times.  It is this energy that motivates me to create art. As a painter, I strive to hold the distinctive shimmer of these components while creating an orchestra of diverse voices.”
2. Inspirations: “The lives of people around me – those whose lives and actions may go unnoticed many a times, but who exemplify great human survival and fortitude.”
3. On the wall at home: “If I were to pick just a few, they would definitely be Andreas Gursky, Gregory Crewdson, Neo Rauch and Salman Toor.”
4. Concerns that find a place in your art: “How in a city, the life of one person is interlinked with that of another, and as members of society, all that we do influences that of others who are a part of this whole.”
5. If not an artist, you would be… “working in cinema or any related form of visual expression.”

Cameos Of A City is on display at Sakshi Gallery, Mumbai (6/19, 2nd Floor, Grants Building, Arthur Bunder Road, Colaba) until October 8, 2016.