From Mr. Malhotra’s Party – Photograph © Sunil Gupta
Curator and cultural activist, artist and writer, Sunil Gupta is a man of many talents, and with much to offer younger artists and society at large. He challenges our assumptions about people and cultural norms, and delves into the topics of sexuality, gender, and race.
A teenaged Gupta left Delhi with his family for Montreal in 1969. After earning a degree in accounting from Concordia University (1977), he attended the Royal College of Art in London, where he earned his MA (1983). He remained in London until 2005, when he returned to India to pursue artistic projects, returning again to London to pursue a PhD at the University of Westminster (2018).
Gupta was involved in the formation of the Institute of International Visual Art (INIVA), currently housed at Chelsea College of Art, London, as one of the original curatorial franchisees in 1992. He was part of NIGAH, a queer activist group in Delhi, which ran workshops and cultural events to raise awareness and a public discourse, including, Nigah QueerFest, an annual Festival featuring a photo exhibition at Max Mueller Bhavan.
Sunil Gupta began his work as a curator in 1986, with the exhibition Same Difference, which he curated with Jean Fraser for Camerawork. That was followed by Ecstatic Antibodies, curated with Tessa Boffin, for Impressions Gallery, 1988-90, which also toured. In 2013, Gupta curated A Photograph is Not an Opinion – Contemporary Photography by Women, for Focus Festival, Mumbai. In 2018, he curated India for Houston Fotofest with Steven Evans. Between those early exhibitions and these latest festivals, Gupta started OVA in 1992 as an INIVA Franchise to curate shows of post-colonial contemporary art to tour in the UK and overseas, from 1995 it was independent company until 2004. He organized solo touring shows for Simryn Gill (Australia / Singapore / Malaysia), Sarindar Dhaliwal (India / UK / Canada), Joy Gregory (UK), and Roshini Kempadoo (Guyana / UK / Trinidad), among others.
Gupta’s work has been shown widely, from Belfast to Brisbane to Beijing and beyond. Solo exhibitions and group shows, and exhibition commissions, he has also worked in film and video. His work has been exhibited in Australia, Canada, China, Cuba, Denmark, England, France, Germany, India, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Scotland, Spain, Switzerland, the U.A.E, the U.S., and Wales.
His work is in public collections including: Arts Council of Great Britain; Cartwright Hall, Bradford; Fine Arts Museum, Houston; Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University; George Eastman House, Rochester; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Museum of RISD, Providence; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; Nat’l Museum of Film, TV & Photography, Bradford; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia; Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane; Tate, London; Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Tokyo; and the University of Southampton, Southampton.
Gupta has received many honors, awards, and recognitions over the course of his career. Some highlights are: Artist in Residence, Light Work, Syracuse (2003); AHRB Fellowship in Creative & Performing Arts, University of Southampton (2002); Arts Council of England, for the Diversity Project (2001); Canada Council Book Award for Publishing, The New Republics: Contemporary Art from Australia, Canada and South Africa (2000); British Council, For travel & installation expenses, Havana Biennial (1994); London Arts Board, Individual Artist’s Grant (1993); British Council, Travel Award (1990, 1992); Arts Council, Research Grant, for Disrupted Borders, art & book project (1991); Arts Council, Project Development Grant, for Ecstatic Antibodies (1990); British Council, Travel Award, Randolph Street Gallery, Chicago (1988); RCA-3M – Royal College of Art Graduating Students Portfolio Award) (1983).
Gupta was an attendee of the SPE / MNF Photo Education Symposium, 5-7.Jan.2020, in New Delhi.
Some of the books by and/or about Sunil Gupta include:
An Economy of Signs – Contemporary Indian Photography, edited by Sunil Gupta, Rivers Oram Press, London & Boston, 1990, ISBN: 1 85489 031 x
Christopher Street, 1976, Stanley Barker, London, 2018, ISBN: 10-1916410685
Click! Contemporary Photography in India, Vadhra Art Gallery, New Delhi, 2010,
ISBN: 10-8187737816
Delhi: Communities of Belonging, with Charan Singh, The New Press, New York, 2016,
ISBN: 10-1620972654
Dissent & Desire, with Charan Singh, Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, 2018,
ISBN: 10-1933619716
Ecstatic Antibodies: Resisting the AIDS Mythology, Rivers Oram Press, London, 1990,
ISBN: 10-1854890050
Lovers: Ten Years On, 2020, Stanley Barker, London
Queer, Prestel Publishers, New York, 2011, ISBN: 10-3791350994
Sunil Gupta: From Here to Eternity, 2020, Autograph, London
Sunil Gupta: Pictures from Here, Chris Boot Publishing, London & New York, 2003,
ISBN: 10-0954231322
Copyright © 2021, PhotoSouthAsia. All Rights Reserved.
Also on PhotoSouthAsia, find this essay on Gupta's work:
The Politics of Identity, by photographer Ram Rahman
As Section 377 is Struck Down, a Look Back at an Indian Photographer’s Images of a Queer Movement by Amina Khan, Scroll.in, 07.Sep.2018
Helmut Lang and Sunil Gupta Revisit a Long-Gone Christoper Street by Dan Adler, Vanity Fair, 11.Feb.2020.
I Am a Camera: LGBTQ Communities Seen from Within, Fotofest International 2015
Queer Migrations: Family, Identity, and Place Photographs by Sunil Gupta, Whitney Humanities Center, Yale, New Haven, CT, 05.Feb-20.May.2015
Sunil Gupta. Out and About: New York and New Delhi, Musée: Vanguard of Photography Culture, 10.Nov.2014, at SepiaEYE 07.Nov-20.Dec.2014
Sunil Gupta: Queer by Alison Zavos, Feature Shoot, 12.Jul.2011
Being in the Darkroom is Healing, Art & Artists: Sunil Gupta, Tate.org
FotoFest Curator Sunil Gupta Previews 2018 Biennial, 07.Dec.2017 [The camera pulls out to show the work after the first couple of artists.]
Flying Outside My Body, directed by Sushmit Ghosh, Rintu Thomas, Sumit Sharma, Ajeeta Chowhan, produced by AJK MCRC, Jamia Milia Islamia, Culture unPluged, 2008 (A student graduation film about the artist's practice in Delhi.)
Images from India: Sunil Gupta on Photography as Critical Practice, The Freer | Sachler Gallery, Washington D.C., 16.Mar.2018
Presentation at SPE / MNF Photo Education Event, 5-7.Jan.2020, New Delhi.
Comments on SPE / MNF Photo Education Event, 5-7.Jan.2020, New Delhi.
In 1988, Gupta co-founded Autograph: The Association of Black Photographers, a publicly funded coalition of photographers of Asian & African descent. In 2002 the name was changed to Autograph ABP. Begun by Sunil Gupta, Monika Baker, and others.
July 22, 2017
