It’s A Jungle Out There: Art That Celebrates And Critiques The Urban Jungle

No artist can detach herself/himself from the contents of her/his creation. All Art is confessional at one layer or the other exposing the artist’s myriad layers of sensitivity, which transforms and evolves from time to time and very often reacts and responds to external stimuli. The exhibition ‘It’s a Jungle Out There', conceived and curated by Pragati Agarwal, Founder of Art Tree is no exception.

How 'It’s A Jungle Out There' Aptly Captures The Chaos Of Urbanisation

It can be interpreted as an exploration of the nuances of the contemporary urban landscape using various metaphors and symbolic emblems, predominantly of animals and their imagery, to highlight the living chaos. These works also depict multi-layered sensibility originating from rural backdrops such as Shantiniketan and traversing across urban wonders such as New York. It is a playful expose’ of the sometimes-insensitive modernity distorting the bountiful offerings of nature to selfishly align with contemporary all-pervasive consumerism. 

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The surreal realms of the cityscape along with animal imagery highlight the dwindling of a robust ecosystem that once protected the wonder of forest creatures. Mann’s works expose the folly of human beings in distorting their environment along with other natural habitats. While the depiction is a satire on wild urbanisation and the taming of jungles, it is a cry for attention towards a damaged environment that is displacing all living beings and making them vulnerable to extinction. And yet it's not all bad. The grandeur of the cityscapes brings hope and joy, juxtaposing past and present, new and old and the mystic and physical. 

Many works in this collection reconnoitre the Brutalist architecture of Chandigarh in a hypnagogic manner while adding a lot of funkiness and drollery. Chandigarh has seen a massive shift in its ecological setting in the past seventy years, ever since Le Corbusier created this modern city of brilliance in the heart of historic India in the 1950s. From a backdrop of the lower Shivalik Range jungles that housed legions of wildlife such as leopards, elephants, horses, wolves, wild boar, deer and apes, along with countless species of birds, it is now a massive and growing tricity that houses more than two million people with barely any wildlife! 

The ‘Divine Feminine‘ works manifest the strength of the woman across ages. The expressions flaunt the fierce individuality of women bordering from spirituality to playfulness and sexuality, elevating the feminine form from a thing of beauty to a strong universal force. The female explores her quintessential being while transcending myths and flirting with primordial truths.
The colour palette of this collection enhances the vibrancy and adds a fantasy-like and dream element to an otherwise sombre and severe theme. These works can be best described as caricatures of the urban jungle and displaced habitats, through light-hearted but solemn strokes.