Sutapa Biswas (b.1962, Shantiniketan, India) is a conceptual artist currently residing and working in London, UK. Biswas works with a range of mediums, including painting, installation, drawing, film and time- based media.Her poignant films and poetic artworks have been shown in museums and art galleries worldwide. Biswas studied at the University of Leeds from 1981-85, at the Slade School of Art from 1988-1990, and at the Royal College of Art between 1996-1998. Sutapa Biswas has taught Fine Art with Art History at undergraduate and postgraduate level (including MPhil and PhD supervision) for over 30 years. Most recently, Biswas was a Reader, Chelsea College of Art and Design, CCW, UAL (2006-2012) and where, in total, she taught for over 23 years.
Since the mid 1990s Biswas has been interested in exploring themes of time, gender, identity and desire in relationship to space or systems of knowledge and power in her art. Biswas often draws from myths and iconography from ancient Hindu mythologies, speaking of the symbolism she says “I want people to research into my culture, as I've been doing into European and Western culture”.
Through her art, Biswas intention of creating is to present works to which the viewer responds on a visceral level; a context within which they are transported to a place somewhere within their own past, and which visually and poetically unsettles perceptions of time and place.
Selected solo exhibitions include Lumen, New Art Gallery Walsall, UK (2021); SUTAPA BISWAS, Recent Works by Sutapa Biswas, the Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery, Reed College, Portland, Oregon, USA (2006); SUTAPA BISWAS, Recent works by Sutapa Biswas, anddrawings by Joseph Turner and Edward Lear, Harewood House, Yorkshire, UK (2004); SUTAPA BISWAS, Recent Works, by Sutapa Biswas, Café Gallery Projects, London, UK (2004); Sutapa Biswas, Untitled (woman in blue, weeping), Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada Video installation (2000); Murmur, by Biswas, S., Atlas Studio Space, London (1994) Synapse / To Kill Two Birds With One Stone, by Biswas, S., Plug In Gallery, Winnipeg, Canada (1994) Murmur, by Biswas, S., The Western Front, Vancouver, Canada (2003); Synapse, Sutapa Biswas, Gallerie OBORO, Montreal, Canada (2004); Synapse, by Biswas, S., The Photographer’s Gallery, London, and City Art Gallery, Leeds (1992); Synaptic, by Biswas, S., Or Gallery, Vancouver, Canada (1992).
Selected group exhibitions include Miami Basel, Miami, USA (2006); Melborne International Arts Festival, Melborne, Austalia (2006); Elizabeth Leach Gallery, Portland, Oregon, USA (2006); 3rd Clerkenwell Film and Video Festival, London, Hayward Gallery, London (2005); Royal Academy of Arts, London (2005); Tate Modern, London, UK (2002-03); Henie Onstad Kunstsenter, Oslo, Norway (2001); Kampnagel, Hamburg, Germany. Biswas, S., Frieze, Scarred Surface and Synapse I in Crown Jewels. Touring to Berlin, sponsored by the British Council (1999); Ludwig Museum of Contemporary Art, Budapest. Biswas, S., White Noise and Synapse I in Identity and Environment, sponsored by The British Council (1999); Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, USA. Biswas, S., Scarred Surface, Frieze and Untitled in The Unmapped Body: 3 Black British Artists (1998); 6th Havana Biennial, Cuba. Biswas, S., Synapse I, Synapse II, and Untitled Drawing in the Sexta Bienal de La Habana – el individuo y su memoria, mayo, junio, Havana, Cuba (1997).
Biswas filmography includes Remembrance of Things Past (2006), Birdsong (2004), Magnesium Bird (2004), Untitled (Bit Part) (2003), Under My Table (2003) 10.30 a.m. (2003), Untitled (The Trials and Tribulations of Mickey Baker) (1997) Untitled (Woman in blue weeping) (1996), Murmur (1993), Kali (1985).
Highlights and collection
Biswas’ works have been widely reviewed and are held in numerous collections including: TATE Collections, Arts Council England, Sheffield Museums and Art Galleries, APT New York, Reed College (USA). She has also lectured widely internationally including for: the Whitney Programme, New York; Stanford University; New York University; Mills College, USA; University of British Columbia; Ruskin School of Art, Oxford University.