“I am a mirror. When I paint, you see not what I have made but what you want to see. I, Seema Kohli, painter and teller of stories, am both myth and reality. Pick the one you want. But remember, the mirror distorts: and so the myth might be reality, and reality, in turn, may be myth.”

Born in 1960 in New Delhi, Seema Kohli is an artist with an eclectic repertoire. Her art, a unique expression of her largely figurative style, encompasses a wide range of mediums including painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, performance and experiential installation. Her works are parables of tales both imagined and real, celebrating the simultaneous fragility and tenacity of Creation, as well as the melody and exuberance of the Oneness of Being. Myth and fable apart, they are many layered explorations, rooted as much in philosophy as they are in the knowledge of our modern times.

Seema’s solo exhibitions have been shown in Brussels, Melbourne, London, New York, Dubai, Singapore, Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. Her works have been exhibited in the Venice Biennale in 2015 and 2014 and in the Beijing Biennale in 2012. She has shown at the India Art Fair in 2022, at the Hong Kong Art Fair in 2015, at the Shanghai Art Fair in 2011, at ARCO Madrid in 2010 and at Art Basel in 2009. She has been the recipient of a Gold Medal at the Florence Biennale in 2009, the Lalit Kala Academi Lifetime Achievement Award for Women in 2008 and the Young FICCI Ladies Organisation Women Achiever’s Award in the same year.

Her works have been collected by the British Museum, London; the Birth Rite Collection, London; Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, New Delhi; the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, New Delhi; the Rubin Museum of Art, New York; the Museum of Sacred Art, Brussels; and the Museum of Art, Kochi.

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS

2022, Tat Tvam Asi, a solo exhibition at Cromwell Place Galleries, London by SA Fine Art
2021, The Feminine in the Divine, a solo exhibition at South Asian Art Gallery, Boston
2021, Hiranyagarbha series shown in Yatra Nariyasathu, a group show at the NGMA, Delhi, curated by Uma Nair
2020, A Tapestry of Time, a group show at the Tao Art Gallery, Mumbai
2020, Come Play with Me shown in Matter in Matrix, a group printmaking show at Latitude 28, New Delhi
2019, Project Home, a solo exhibition at Kolkata Centre for Creativity (KCC), Kolkata
2018, What a Body Remembers, a solo exhibition at Tao Art Gallery, Mumbai
2017, works on paper from the Golden Womb Series shown in G/Rove, a group show at Latitude 28, New Delhi, curated by Advait Singh
2016, Kamadhenu sculptures shown in Forms of Devotion: The Spiritual in Indian Art, a group show at the Museum of Sacred Arts, Conde Duque- Madrid.
2015, The Other Self, a solo exhibition at the Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai
2015, Chausat Yogini, a collateral event with India Art Fair at the Art Heritage Gallery, New Delhi
2014, Raks-e-shams, shown in collaboration with Veda Gallery in a collateral event during the 2nd Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Kochi
2014, Haranyagarbha, part of Taste The Future: Personal Structures, Venice
2014, in a group show at Kairen Weber Gallery, Hong Kong
2009, One Way Ticket shown at ARCO, Madrid
2009, Swayamsiddha performed at Gabron Museum, Madrid
2009, Untitled paper works shown at Art Basel, Basel
2009, Swayamsiddha, shown at Florence Biennale, Florence
2009, Swayamsiddha, a solo exhibition at Rabindra Bhavan, Lalit Kala Academy, New Delhi
2002, The Golden Egg, a solo exhibition at Triveni Kala Sangam, New Delhi hosted by Art Heritage
1998, The Quest, a solo exhibition at AIFACS, New Delhi