For India Art Fair 2026, KYNKYNY Art Gallery foregrounds material as thought, labour and encounter

Ahead of India Art Fair 2026, KYNKYNY Art Gallery’s presentation sets out its position clearly. This is a showcase driven by substance rather than spectacle, by the ways materials are handled, resisted and listened to. Curated by co-founder and director Vivek Radhakrishnan, the booth brings together works by Sandilya Theuerkauf, Meenal Singh and Janarthanan Rudhramoorthy, three artists whose practices diverge widely yet converge around an insistence on process and material intelligence.

A closer look at KYNKYNY Art Gallery's booth at India Art Fair

For Radhakrishnan, materiality provided the starting point. “Materiality was the theme leading my curation for this year’s India Art Fair presentation,” he explains. “Though each artist has their own inspiration, narrative and thought process, their chosen materials play a vital role in telling each story.” The intention was never to smooth out difference, but to place distinct approaches side by side, allowing plant matter, oil pigment and metal to speak in their own registers.

Sandilya Theuerkauf’s sculptural reliefs grow directly out of time spent in forests and natural landscapes. Working exclusively with fallen organic matter, bark, vines, thorns and seeds, he limits each piece to a single plant species. Form emerges through sustained observation rather than interpretation, with the plant’s own structure determining colour, texture and rhythm.

This approach draws from his background in ecology and conservation, yet the resulting works avoid overt messaging. Instead, they create an intimate encounter between viewer and material. Radhakrishnan sees this as central to their impact. “He creates mesmerising imagery where a tree speaks for itself, but through a conversation it has had with him,” he notes.

In contrast, Meenal Singh’s large-scale oil paintings unfold through fluid movement and gravity. Trained as an architect, Singh came to painting with a desire for continuity and endurance. “Oil paint in some way provided stable parameters for me, with its rootedness in the past,” she says.

Working without brushes or tools, Singh allows pigment to spread freely across the canvas. The resulting compositions are often read as abstracted terrains, with linear shifts suggesting geological formations or distant horizons. She welcomes these readings, seeing the viewer as essential to the work’s meaning. Once a process is repeated enough, she explains, it begins to feel intuitive, opening space for contemplation rather than assertion.

Janarthanan Rudhramoorthy’s iron and steel sculptures bring a different form of intensity. Sheets of metal, nails and rust are treated not as inert matter but as collaborators. “My relationship with material begins as a conversation, not a command,” he says.

Resistance plays an active role in determining how the work develops, influencing decisions as much as intention does. Rudhramoorthy frequently returns to nest-like structures and impressions of the body, using iron and steel to think through fragility, exposure and change.

Across the three practices, a shared ethic emerges: material is not a vehicle for meaning but a generator of it. This outlook reflects KYNKYNY’s broader trajectory over more than two decades.

“It has always been important to us to offer a supportive platform to artists who dare to veer from the traditional path,” Radhakrishnan says. While the gallery has shown work across mediums, it has consistently gravitated towards artists whose engagement with material opens unfamiliar ways of seeing.

As India Art Fair approaches, KYNKYNY’s booth positions itself as a space for pause within a fast-moving environment. The gallery hopes visitors will respond viscerally before analytically. “When you experience something new, and it moves you in some way, that unbiased emotion is where the magic is,” Radhakrishnan says. It is an invitation to encounter contemporary Indian art through touch, weight and flow, where meaning gathers slowly through matter itself.

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