About the Artist and his work :
Born : 20th October, 1933.
Education :
Govt. college of Art & craft, Kolkata
Prakash Karmarkar came from an artistic family; his father was a renowned artist of his time.
Unfortunately, all of his father’s paintings were destroyed in the Hindu Muslim riots in the 1940s, which also ruined his family.
By 1949, both his parents had passed away, forcing him to abandon his studies at the Government College of Arts and Crafts, Kolkata.
He joined the army for two years and then quit to work as a graphic design manager for a medical firm in Kolkata.
Virtually penniless and desperate for a break, in 1956, he held a street exhibition, the first in the city, hanging his works along a corner.
Selected Exhibitions :
2008 – ‘Hues of Bengal’,Janues Art Gallery
2008 – ‘Art from Bengal’,Art Elements Gallery,New Delhi
2008 – ‘The Artecurate ‘, Mumbai Art Festival.
2007 – ‘Signatures Images’,Gallery Kolkata,Kolkata
2007 – ‘Uninterrupted Journeys’, Nitanjali Art Gallery,New Delhi
2007 – ‘Tales of Textures’, Art Elements Gallery,New Delhi
2006 – ‘Drawing show an act of Art –II’,Priyasri Art Gallery,Mumbai
2006 – ‘Frames & Beyond’,Neheru Center,Mumbai
1968-65-67 – National Art Exhibition, at Lalit Kala Academy, New Delhi
Awards :
2000 – He was a recipient of Abinendra Puraskar Award
1976 – Awards from Biria Academy of Art and Culture, Kolkata
1970 – Rabindra Bharati University, Kolkata.
1969-70 – Fellowship for Study in France.
Style :
Prakash Karmakar is considered a revolutionary in the sense that he doesn’t exhibit in art galleries. All through his artistic career he has always exhibited on street corners because he did not want his paintings to be imprisoned within four walls. Most of his earlier artworks capture remembrances from the past – some of them are very personal, and some are from the darkest moments of human history. More recently he has painted landscapes, depicting lush tropical vegetation, hills and valleys, seascapes and mangroves in their wild diversity – which have made him even more popular with art galleries.
Large fish-shaped eyes are assets of Prakash Karmakar females by which he is often recalled. More so because his female are rendered askew with voluptuous curves, drunken stare and sometimes wantonly explicit erotic gestures. At one time, quite early in his life his demonic damsels, femmes’ fatales, or nudes with fleshy shapes of sensual bulge or dismembered limbs or focused genitalia became his signature images. His landscapes too with their piquant painterly refashioning of natural forms and by sheer force of their varied recurrence are currently a fresh subject-index of his style.
