Kalpathi Ganpathi Subramanyan (1924 – 2016)

K.G. Subramanyan was one of India’s iconic artists and educators. He belonged to that generation looking for a collective national identity through art and indigenous design.
Born in Kerala in 1924, he was part of the Indian Independence movement during his youth. In 1944, he joined Kala Bhavan, Shantiniketan, to pursue art. He subsequently moved to Baroda to teach and he made the city home.

Subramanyan’s relationship with the Weavers Service Centre began with making textile designs in 1959. As a design thinker, he was an integral part of the efforts being made to revive Indian textile design. At the New York World Fair in 1965, Subramanyan used hemp fibres and discarded pieces of cloth to create a massive textile relief, stressing on the interdependence of art and craft in the Indian design vocabulary.

In 1966, the artist was given a Rockefeller Grant to travel to New York. This was a very productive time for Subramanyan. In addition to canvas works, he undertook a series of works on paper that have come to be retrospectively titled, Markers, alluding to the marker pens he used in their making. IMPACT includes examples of this period as well as elements from his extensive relationship with book design.

A recipient of all three Padma awards, KG Subramanyan was a true pioneer.