In this online exhibition, we uncover the remarkable and largely unseen archive of Suresh Punjabi, whose photographs chronicle the social and personal lives of a diverse community of people from the industrial town of Nagda, Madhya Pradesh. The Business of Dreams: Photographs from the Studio of Suresh Punjabi consists of ninety portraits made by Punjabi in Nagda and is the most comprehensive exploration of Punjabi’s work to date, drawing from existing literature, visual analyses, technical histories and, crucially, numerous conversations with the artist.
While the studio continues to be in operation today, this exhibition focuses mainly on a body of work from between 1979 and 1990. Not only was this period his most prolific, but it also aligns with a time when studios were becoming increasingly common outside major cities, while personal cameras were still a luxury commodity. Suhag Studio, like thousands across the country, became significant to the daily lives of those it served, as Punjabi’s clients commissioned him for a range of photographs, from the formal and administrative to the informal and ceremonial. Having digitally remastered the negatives, MAP presents them in their original clarity to new online audiences, over forty years after Suhag Studio first opened its doors.
Suresh Punjabi, Untitled (Portrait of a woman with a bunch of grapes), 1981
VISIBLE/INVISIBLE: Representation of Women in Art through the MAP Collection September 1, 2023
With great ease: The photography of T. S. Satyan Aug 12, 2023 - Nov 20, 2023
Jyoti Bhatt: Time & Time Again Feb 27, 2023 - Feb 27, 2024
KG Subramanyan: Bahurupee in the Panorama May 18, 2022 - Aug 18, 2022
Painted Stitches, Woven Stories-II Feb 18, 2022 - May 18, 2022
Sights and Sounds Dec 2, 2021 - Mar 2, 2022