Rina Banerjee (born 1963) is an

Indian-American Indian Americans or Indo-Americans are citizens of the United States with ancestry from India. The United States Census Bureau uses the term Asian Indian to avoid confusion with Native Americans, who have also historically been referred to ...

artist and sculptor."Bio"
Rinabanerjee.com, Retrieved online 17 October 2018. She currently lives and works in New York City. Her ambitious mid-career survey exhibition, ''Make Me a Summary of the World''––co-organized by and exhibited at the

Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) is a museum and private art school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

and the San Jose Museum of Art––opened in 2018 and is slated to travel to the Fowler Museum at UCLA, the Frist Art Museum in Nashville, TN, and the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, NC through July 2021.

Early life and career

In 1963, Banerjee was born in a Bengali family in

Calcutta Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, the official name until 2001) is the Capital city, capital of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal, on the eastern ba ...

(now

Kolkata Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...

) in the

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

n state of

West Bengal West Bengal (, Bengali: ''Poshchim Bongo'', , abbr. WB) is a state in the eastern portion of India. It is situated along the Bay of Bengal, along with a population of over 91 million inhabitants within an area of . West Bengal is the fou ...

. She grew up in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

and

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

, and has lived in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

ever since. Banerjee has mentioned in interviews that the inspiration for her art comes from her childhood memories of visiting her grandfather during his homeopathic treatments. Many of the images and visuals from her visits with her grandfather have stayed with her and can be seen in her art work. She likes her artwork to be not static, but ever changing. She completed an M.F.A. in Painting and Printmaking from

Yale School of Art The Yale School of Art is the art school of Yale University. Founded in 1869 as the first professional fine arts school in the United States, it grants Masters of Fine Arts degrees to students completing a two-year course in graphic design, painti ...

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Sta ...

in 1995, after graduating from Case Western Reserve University,

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

with a

B.S. A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University ...

Polymer Engineering Polymer engineering is generally an engineering field that designs, analyses, and modifies polymer materials. Polymer engineering covers aspects of the petrochemical industry, polymerization, structure and characterization of polymers, properties of ...

. Banerjee's work has been exhibited at the

Bronx Museum of the Arts The Bronx Museum of the Arts (BxMA), also called the Bronx Museum of Art or simply the Bronx Museum, is an American cultural institution located in Concourse, Bronx, New York. The museum focuses on contemporary and 20th-century works created by ...

, the

Whitney Museum of American Art The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is an art museum in the Meatpacking District and West Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1930 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–194 ...

, and other notable museums.

Exhibitions

Below is a list of some of Banerjee's solo and group exhibits. * 1998: ''Home within a Harem'', Colgate University Gallery, NY * 2000: ''Auf Weidersehen,'' Admit One,

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

, NY — Banerjee uses Asian and Western materials. The exhibit has plastic tubing that runs along the walls and ending which end with rotten-looking fruit and leaves. The plants in the show represent tropical plants that were taken by western settlers to bring to other countries; some of the plants didn't translate well to other land while some blossomed. The room is also filled with a thick webbing which is meant to represent a digestive system, and within the system colorful ritual powder and spices are captured. * 2001: ''Antenna'', Bose Pacia Modern, New York * 2001: ''Phantasmal Pharmacopeia'', Debs & Company,

, NY * 2002: ''Phantasmal Pharmacopeia'', curated by Susette Min,

Painted Bride Art Center The Painted Bride Art Center, sometimes referred to informally as The Bride, is a non-profit artist-centered performance space and gallery particularly oriented to presenting the work of local Philadelphia artists, which presents dance, jazz, w ...

, Philadelphia, PA (catalogue) * 2006: ''Fantasies without travel will travel'', AMT Gallery, Como, Italy * 2007: ''Foreign Fruit'', Galerie

Nathalie Obadia Nathalie Obadia (born 14 March 1962) is a French art gallery owner. She specialises in contemporary art. Early life She was born in Toulouse, France. As a teenager, Nathalie Obadia completed an internship at Daniel Varenne, in Genova, and Adri ...

, Paris * 2007: ''"Where the Wild Things Are" ...is no place at all and all places that cannot be lived in but visited, realized out of our careful, playful and tenacious tourism of others, realized as our mobility wanders too far'', Galerie Volker Diehl, Berlin (2007) * 2008: ''Distant Nearness'' (with

Bharti Kher Bharti Kher is a contemporary artist. In a career spanning nearly three decades, she has worked across painting, sculpture and installation. Throughout her practice she has displayed an unwavering relationship with the body, its narratives, and ...

and Subodh Gupta),

Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art The Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art is an art museum that is part of Johnson County Community College in Overland Park, Kansas. The Nerman Museum is named for donors Jerry and Margaret Nerman. It opened in October 2007, succeeding the college' ...

, Kansas City, KS * 2008: ''Allure'', Gallery Espace, New Delhi, India * 2009: ''Look into my eyes and you will see a world unexplainable, out of place'', Galerie Nathalie Obadia, Brussels * 2009: ''Rina Banerjee and Raqib Shaw'', Thomas Gibson Ltd., London * 2010: ''Forever Foreign'',

Haunch of Venison Haunch of Venison was a contemporary art gallery operating from 2002 until 2013. It supported the work of contemporary leading artists, presented a broad and critically acclaimed program of exhibitions to a large public through international exh ...

, London — Banerjee's first solo show in the UK. * 2011: ''Chimeras of India & the West'', Musée Guimet,

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

* 2011: ''Imagining the other half of the world from here'', Galerie Nathalie Obadia, Paris * 2012: ''Creationismʼs Kiss'', Galerie Nathalie Obadia, Brussels * 2012: ''A World of Lies'', Galerie Espace, Hong Kong, China * 2013: ''Bowerbirdnest'', Future Perfect, Singapore * 2013: ''A world lost'', The Smithsonian Sackler Gallery, Washington, D.C. * 2013: ''What am I made of and how do you know my name?'', Ota Fine Art, Tokyo * 2013: ''Seven Sisters,'' Jenkins Johnson Gallery, San Francisco, CA * 2014: ''Of Men and Worlds'', curated by Alain Berland, College des Bernardins, Paris * 2014: ''Disgust'',

L.A. Louver L.A. Louver is an art gallery focusing on American and European contemporary art. The gallery is located in Venice, Los Angeles, California, United States. Directors The gallery directors are Peter Goulds, Kimberly Davis, and Elizabeth East. Li ...

Venice Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 bridges. The isla ...

, CA — Her four sculptures in this show are made from an uncountable number of small objects that are wired and strung together. She uses cowry shells, rooster feathers, gourds, acrylic horns, glass vials, silk, and many other objects. Her sculptures could be either human or animal, still life or moving. It seems as though Banerjee does not look through junk to find materials for her art, but instead will selectively choose what she wants by ordering her materials off of specialty sites. This selective process she uses emphasizes the global culture of her art, and how she has many different pieces from all over the world, all of which form one cohesive work of art. * 2015: ''Migrations Breath'', OTA Fine Arts, Gillman Barracks,

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...

— Colorful yet suggestive pieces of art, which seem to change with different angles or positions. She uses many objects in her works such as Indian sarees, glass bottles, and seashells. Critics have suggested that some of the names of Banerjee's artwork carry sexual implications. For example, the piece ''She Drew A Premature Prick'' and many of the pieces have been suggested to represent reproductive organs. Banerjee has said that she enjoys the way that artwork can be fluid and how one's perspective could change with something so simple as wind blowing. *2019: ''Rina Banerjee: Make Me a Summary of the World'', Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia; Traveling to San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA; Fowler Museum at University of California, Los Angeles, CA; Frist Art Museum, Nashville, TN; Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, NC *2019: ''Rina Banerjee: Blemish'', Hosfelt Gallery, San Francisco *2020: Irresistible Earth, an uncontrollable and unconditional love is bestowed to us upon birth. Love for nature infinitely ripening, delicious and dangerous, their fruits, a fermented and fresh gorgeous beauty…, Galerie Nathalie Obadia, Brussels, Belgium *2020: Vapor, Thread, Fire and Earth, between ground and sky Masculine Mythologies and Feminine Escapes, Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), Jacksonville, FL *2020: Make Me A Summary of the World, Traveling Solo Retrospective: curated by Jodi Throckmorton and Lauren Dickens, Frist Art Museum, Nashville, TN *2021: Irresistible Earth, Kunsthall 3,14, Bergen, Norway *2022: Blemish, In Deep Pink Everything Begins, Hunterdon Museum, Clinton, NJ *2023: Take Me to the Palace of Love, Syracuse University Art Museum, Syracuse, New York *2023: Black Noodles, Perrotin, New York, NY

References

External links

Rina Banerjee
at Artsy.net
Rina Banerjee
at ULAN
Rina Banerjee
at the

{{DEFAULTSORT:Banerjee, Rina American people of Bengali descent Painters from New York (state) Indian emigrants to the United States Case Western Reserve University alumni Yale School of Art alumni 20th-century Indian painters Living people 1963 births 20th-century Bengalis Bengali Hindus 21st-century Bengalis Bengali artists Bengali women artists American women painters Artists from Kolkata American women sculptors Indian women painters Indian women contemporary artists Indian contemporary painters 20th-century Indian women artists American women artists of Indian descent Women artists from West Bengal Painters from West Bengal Sculptors from New York (state) 21st-century American women artists American people of Indian descent