Monali Meher was born in Pune in 1969 and graduated from Sir J.J. School of Arts in Mumbai. In 1998, she received an ‘Unesco-Aschberg’ residency in Vienna from the Federal Chancellery for Arts and Science and staged her first performance entitled Reflect: A personal window display at Jehangir Art Gallery in Mumbai. From that moment onward, she has performed and exhibited her work internationally in acclaimed museums and institutions, including the Tate Modern in London (2006) and the Sinop Biennale in Turkey (2006).
In 2000-01, she received an artist residency at the Rijksakademie Van Beeldende Kunsten funded by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Since 2000, Meher has lived and worked in Amsterdam.
– date: 2012
– title: La porta trasparente
– medium: installation, wood and glass structures, electrical wires, and light bulbs
– size: environment
– description: The installation entitled La porta Trasparente was donated to the Municipal Collection of Contemporary Art of San Giovanni Valdarno upon completion of the first edition of the Contemporary Renaissance artist residency held in November-December 2012. During her stay in Italy, Monali Meher drew inspiration from her experience with the new environment, the surrounding nature and architecture, interior spaces, and people and their customs. In particular, La porta Trasparente is a specific reference to the miracle of the milk that is recalled in the Basilica Santa Maria delle Grazie and, above all, the environment created in the Basilica thanks to the moderate use of light that evokes a profound sense of intimate mystery. In her installation, Meher recreates this stylistic feature, replicating it serially. And, as it often occurs with her works, the element borrowed from the past or the reality is transformed and conveyed to the viewer in a different shape, which is open to multiple interpretations. These changes in terms of nature and substance implemented by the Indian artist ignite a dialogue between matter and memory, evoking the past and stirring the reaction of the viewer.