Indian contemporary artist Prabhakar Pachpute has been shortlisted for the ninth Artes Mundi Prize.
Founded in 2002, the biennial prize is given by Artes Mundi, an internationally focused arts organisation that identifies, recognises and supports contemporary visual artists who engage with the human condition, social reality and lived experience.
It carries a cash prize of 40,000 Pound sterling.
Pachpute is known for working with an array of mediums and materials including drawing, light, stop-motion animations, sound and sculptural forms. His use of charcoal has a direct connection to his subject matter and familial roots, coal mines and coal miners.
The Pune-based artist often creates immersive and dramatic environments in his site-specific works, using portraiture and landscape with surrealist tropes to critically tackle issues of mining labour and the effects of mining on the natural and human landscape.
Using Maharashtra as a starting point, the artist combines research from around the world and personal experiences, moving from the personal to the global investigating a complexity of historical transformations on an economic, societal and environmental level.
One of his large-scale site specific work interpreting the "art of protest" is currently on view at Dubai's contemporary art institution Jameel Arts Centre.
The shortlist was selected from over 500 nominations spanning over 60 countries, by a jury comprising of Cosmin Costinas, Executive Director and Curator of Para Site, Hong Kong and Artistic Director of Kathmandu Triennale 2020; Elvira Dyangani-Ose, Director of The Showroom gallery in London; and Rachel Kent, Chief Curator at Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney.
"Encompassing painting and drawing, object making, film and video, their (the shortlisted artists) practices sit within the museum context and beyond; some transform public space and others exist as ephemeral iterations.
"Working against the notion of a centre, they reflect diverse global narratives in both exciting and thoughtful ways. These artists' works reflect powerfully on the changing forces that shape our world - encompassing themes of identity and narration, social structures and collective memory, and industry and ecological crisis," the jury said in a statement.
The other artists on the list include Firelei Bez from Dominican Republic, Dineo Seshee Bopape from South Africa, Meiro Koizumi from Japan, Beatriz Santiago Muoz from Puerto Rico, and Carrie Mae Weems from the USA.
The winner of the prize will be announced in January 2021 during a four-month exhibition from October 2020 to February 2021 at National Museum Cardiff.
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