Artist Karen Knorr donates major works to the Museum of Art & Photography (MAP), Bengaluru

The Museum of Art & Photography (MAP), Bengaluru, has announced the inclusion of the eminent contemporary artist Karen Knorr as a member of the Museum’s Founding Circle, and the addition of her works from the India Song series to the collection. In addition, Knorr has donated her limited edition artworks from the same series to MAP to help raise funds for the Museum’s activities. These will now be available with MAP for sale to those who wish to acquire these works.  

Knorr, whose works have been exhibited at leading international museums, including The Tate, The Victoria & Albert Museum, London, and The Museum of Modern Art, Paris, began her much-acclaimed India Song series in 2008, following a “life-changing trip” to India. The series explores Rajput and Mughal cultural heritage and its relationship to questions of feminine subjectivity and animality. The photographic series considers men’s space (mardana) and women’s space (zanana) in Mughal and Rajput palace architecture, havelis and mausoleums through large-format digital photography. 

Interiors are painstakingly photographed with a large format Sinar P3 analogue camera and scanned to very high resolution. Live animals are inserted into the architectural sites, fusing high resolution digital with analogue photography. Animals photographed in sanctuaries, zoos and cities inhabit palaces, mausoleums, temples and holy sites, interrogating Indian cultural heritage and rigid hierarchies.

Knorr’s works are held in over 30 collections across the world, including The Victoria & Albert Museum, London, The Tate, London, The Museum of Modern Art, Paris, The San Francisco Museum of Art, USA, and now the Museum of Art & Photography (MAP), Bengaluru, India. Born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, raised in San Juan, Puerto Rico and studied in Paris and London, Knorr is currently based in London and is the Professor of Photography at the University for the Creative Arts in Farnham, Surrey. She has also lectured internationally at institutions including The University of Westminster, Goldsmiths College, Harvard University and The Art Institute of Chicago. She continues to produce work on her various trips through Asia and from her studio in London.