India's new arts centre, Hampi Art Labs, is set to open in February 2024 with Right Foot First exhibition and an inaugural residency cycle. 

The new Hampi Art Labs, currently in the final construction stage, is a new arts centre being built near the Indian UNESCO World Heritage site Hampi, India. 

The Hampi Art Labs centre is designed by Mumbai-based architect and Dean of the Faculty of Architecture of CEPT University in Ahmedabad, Sameep Padora and his studio sP+a. 

The new Hampi Art Labs will offer artists world-class facilities for contemporary art-making and emerged as an initiative of JSW Foundation, the social development arm of the JSW Group, one of India’s leading business houses. 

The foundation has shared the first visuals of the building that shows a flowing and organic form, paying tribute to its natural surrounding. The building is made up of locally sourced materials such as soil, stone and steel.

Set to open in February 2024, the building, situated across 18-acres of landscape, will offer artists unique production facilities, an environment to creatively retreat in and galleries for world-class display. 

The site will comprise exhibition spaces, studios and apartments for residencies, gardens, and a café.

Located near the last capital of the last great Hindu Kingdom of Vijayanagar and UNESCO World Heritage Site Hampi, the centre is built upon an ethos of building an interdisciplinary institution inspired by the ancient temple city where art, architecture, and literature flourished from the 14th to 16th centuries. 

Uniquely born of place where art, heritage and nature intermingle, Hampi Art Labs sits in a spectacular setting dominated by the river Tungabhadra, craggy hill ranges and intriguingly large boulders that dot the landscape.

Production facilities will include workshops for printmaking, stone and metal sculpture, ceramics, and new media. In the facility, artists will learn from the region’s richly replete craft culture and distinctive traditions and techniques. 

JSW Vijayanagar Works is the largest state-of-the-art single location steel manufacturing unit in India and its proximity to Hampi Art Labs also affords artists an unparalleled opportunity to work on a large scale and with specialised equipment. Moroever, Hampi Art Labs education programme will offer initiatives engaging local community and international visitors with contemporary art in all its forms. 

Additionally, learning activities and workshops will be developed for schools in the area. The centre aims to create cultural links across the Global South through its residencies, programming and collaborations with like-minded institutions and organisations.

"Hampi Art Labs marks the next chapter"

Hampi Art Labs was founded by Sangita Jindal and her daughter Tarini Jindal Handa who have supported art and heritage in India for over 30 years. 

"Hampi Art Labs marks the next chapter in JSW Foundation’s legacy of supporting the arts ecosystem in India," said Sangita Jindal, Indian businesswoman and the chairperson of the JSW Foundation. 

"It will be a major contribution to arts infrastructure and production facilities in the country and a cultural destination for both local and international visitors." 

"I have had a great affinity to the ancient city of Hampi since I first visited in 1983 and am delighted to now be able connect contemporary art with heritage and nature," she continued.

"The project is also inspired by my mother Urmila Kanoria who founded one of the first residency programmes in India at the Kanoria Centre for Arts in Ahmedabad in 1984," said Jindal. 

The centre will be opened to the public with an exhibition, titled Right Foot First, which will present works from the Jindal Collection from 1998 to 2023 including Andy Warhol, Annie Morris, Atul Dodiya, Ai Weiwei, Bharti Kher, B.V. Doshi, Dayanita Singh, Lubna Chowdhary, Manish Nai, Manu Parekh, Praneet Soi, Reena Saini Kallat, Rohini Devasher, Sayan Chanda, Sheba Chacchi, Shilpa Gupta, Suhasini Kejriwal, Tushar Joag and Zarina Hashmi. 

"Hampi Art Labs is an inclusive artist-first centre that encourages a cross-disciplinary approach"

The exhibition will focus on interdisciplinary connections between artists from across time periods and movements within art history. 

The centre is also planning future exhibitions that will be made up of new commissions and loans, conceptualised by guest curators in response to the centre and its surrounding area or in collaboration with residency alumni. Further, the centre's inaugural residency cycle will welcome Bhasha Chakrabarti, Sharbendu De, Madhavi Gore, Promiti Hossain and Anirudh Singh Shaktawat.

"Hampi Art Labs is an inclusive artist-first centre that encourages a cross-disciplinary approach to art-making and driving engagement with the region’s heritage and artisanal legacy alongside India’s contemporary arts scene," said Tarini Jindal Handa, Managing Director - JSW Realty. 

"We are delighted to have collaborated with Sameep Padora, one of India’s most successful young architects, on the design for Hampi Art Labs. His poetic style of architecture reflects the spiritual energy Hampi is known for," Handa added.

All images courtesy of JSW Foundation.

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