Art & soul: 3 galleries come together as Cymroza turns 50

In 1971, a new art gallery opened in South Bombay’s Breach Sweet precinct, styling by itself as a “gallery for youthful people” and positioned away from the Flora Fountain-Kala Ghoda axis of the city’s art planet.

The Cymroza Artwork Gallery’s founder, Pheroza Shroff (later on Godrej), was in her early twenties. A young painter and university student of English Literature, her commitments spanned a vary of cultural domains, together with the visual arts, literature, new music, theatre, and civic participation.

She experienced the entire assist of her spouse and children, and gave the gallery a composite identify fashioned from theirs: ‘Cy’ for her brother Cyrus ‘m’ for her mom Mitha ‘roz’ for her father Phiroze and ‘a’ for herself.

Her aim: Cymroza would embrace artists, musicians, writers, cultural producers and viewers of just about every temperament and milieu into an increasing loved ones. In the 1970s, Cymroza acted as a lively multi-arts discussion board for youth culture. For the duration of the 1980s, it was a forerunner of the business galleries that would arise in Mumbai for the duration of the next decades. It now turns 50.

Golden age

To celebrate the golden jubilee there will be exhibitions that rejoice its contribution to Mumbai’s artwork earth as perfectly as its founder, Pheroza Godrej’s daily life in art.

The exhibitions variety a constellation throughout 3 venues: Cymroza, Pundole’s, and Chatterjee & Lal. They will open simultaneously on 1 September 2021. Thematically, the contents of each and every exhibition are created to complement every single other. The Cymroza Chronicles will location exceptional performs and archival ephemera on screen at Cymroza, offering a fascinating insight into the gallery’s formative years and exhibition background as well as Godrej’s personal journey with artwork. At Pundole’s, Ranjit Hoskote will curate a big survey exhibition, Mapping the Misplaced Spectrum, incorporating highlights from the selection of Jamshyd and Pheroza Godrej. At Chatterjee & Lal, Nancy Adajania will curate The Unpaved, Crusty, Earthy Street, the very first retrospective of the vital fibre artist Nelly Sethna, an artist championed by Godrej.

In addition to the exhibitions, a series of talks and panel conversations are planned, with a concentration on the heritage of the gallery scene in Mumbai, applying Cymroza as an anchor. A publication is planned for release in early to mid-2022.