Krishen Khanna at 100: The Last Progressive to be held in NGMA Mumbai from November 10

As Krishen Khanna, one of the country’s most revered modern masters, turns 100, the National Gallery of Modern Art, Mumbai, celebrates a century of the maestro’s art, memory, and modernity with an exhibition called Krishen Khanna at 100: The Last Progressive. To be held at the National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA), Mumbai, from November 10 onwards, this exhibition, curated by Dr Zehra Jumabhoy and Kajoli Khanna, is the first museum-based retrospective of Krishen Khanna’s oeuvre. It celebrates his extraordinary artistic journey and his profound contribution to Indian modernism.

Progressive artist Krishen Khanna’s first museum-based retrospective exhibition at NGMA Mumbai

Born in 1925 in Lyallpur, which is now Faisalabad, Pakistan, and brought up in Lahore in British India, Krishen Khanna is a largely self-taught artist whose career has spanned over eight decades. This retrospective starts from Khanna’s Mumbai years in the 1940s, showcasing his documentation of Partition and tracing his journey as an artist.

Khanna’s oeuvre encompasses figurative and abstract painting as well as photography, mixed media, and (more recently) sculpture. The show includes some never-before-seen artworks from the artist’s own collection, family loaned artworks, as well as public and private collections (such as the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and the Jehangir Nicholson Foundation). Also on view will be letters, catalogues, and photographs from his extensive archives. The latter gives us a slice of history – documenting the early years of India’s Modern art movement post-Independence; underscoring the integral part Mumbai, and then Delhi, played in this dialogue.

“This retrospective is deeply personal and profoundly meaningful — both as his granddaughter and as a curator. In his centenary year, I feel a real responsibility to honour his extraordinary journey. It’s been incredibly rewarding to bring together eight decades of his work as one cohesive whole and to invite audiences to rediscover him as an artist whose vision of humanity, belonging, and resilience still resonates so powerfully today,” says Kajoli Khanna, co-curator of the show.

Krishen Khanna at 100 offers a chance to revisit pivotal moments in Khanna’s career, featuring extensive archives and artworks that have so far been inaccessible. It will include Khanna’s early Partition paintings from the 1940s and 1950s, his abstract phase in the 1960s (influenced by his travels via a Rockefeller Grant); dynamic, dark political paintings from the 1970s (which revisit the terrible trauma of the 1947 division of the Subcontinent); paintings from Khanna’s iconic mural projects; experiments with new media and his celebration of the music of the Indian street: his beloved Bandwallahs. The retrospective highlights these rarely-seen artworks in four thematic sections that spiral upwards into the whole museum, culminating in a triumphant celebration of Khanna’s life and art.

“Krishen Khanna is the last of the Progressives, and this exhibition brings his story full circle, from the trauma of Partition and the birth of a modern India to the enduring hope in his portrayal of ordinary people. His work embodies the idea of a plural, syncretic nation; a vision that feels more urgent than ever today,” says Dr Zehra Jumabhoy, co-curator.

Khanna was awarded the Padma Shri (1990), Padma Bhushan (2011) and the Lalit Kala Ratna (2004). Khanna lives and works in Gurgaon, India, and remains the last surviving member of the Bombay Progressives, a living bridge to the defining era of Indian modernism.

Venue: National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA), Mumbai

Dates: November 11 – December 10 2025

Timings: 11 am – 6 pm, closed Mondays

Preview: November 10, 2025

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