tree of life
Five-floor High
Tallest, Largest
Indoor Staircase Mural.
11,500 Sq. Ft. Total Painted Surface.
5,000 Sq. Ft. Glass Facade.
a World Record
Commissioned by Bharti Airtel, Gupta conceptualised and created a first of its kind six floor high, 11500 Sq Ft staircase mural at the Airtel Centre, H.Q. campus. Painting LIVE for three months as a continuous marathon project in front of 4000 employees, Gupta created 3-D to 2-D wall painting composition in two phases; deploying four processes: the conceptual, site specific, collaborative and performance art. In the first phase, he gave the employees the experience of working with him, inviting them to put strokes and idioms on his creation. In the second phase he weaved all it all as a site specific composition, creating a storyline of sustainability with the five elements. It has since been credited as an iconic work of art.
before | after
“The burgeoning tree of life spreads growth and vibrancy in the ever evolving five elements of nature. Each element depicted on respective floor, beginning from earth to water to air, space and fire mingles with one another to create symbolism of an ever-growing state of energy in the universe. The compositions on each floor symbolise the evolving human needs that bind and grow into the next higher stage of consciousness. Beginning with sustenance and fun depicted on the second floor, to love and bonding, celebration and procreation on the third floor represented by the Adam and Eve formed out of the intertwined branches, the peacock and the non-limiting horizon of the sea behind. It then grows to higher needs as the floors progress upwards into the signature umbilical cords of human existence on the fourth floor from where it rises to the ‘gaze’, a reflection of one’s introspection on the fifth level - the window to the soul and only then the larger cosmic ‘glow’ emanating from the sixth floor sinks in to drive home the awareness that one begins to have with experience of life itself. I see the organisation as a symbolism of the above. Hence, as I extended my collaborative art practice to this Mega Mural, the creation shaped from an ever-evolving stage where I let the employees experience color and form and learn the joy of creation. I strove to make the artist in each individual come alive even as I kept creating the larger canvas simultaneously. The passion with which thousands of employees created idioms served as the deriving food for thought for me to transform all multifarious hues, shapes, colors and idioms into a composite mega canvas that spoke one language as a work of art.”
| First Phase : the artist invites his audience |
the beginning | the wide expanse | extending the experience deep |
taking it forward conceptualising | Second Phase : the master’s strokes | the evolving storyline | consolidating and conceptualising | negotiating the 2D vs. 3D site specifics |
bibliography
The Big Picture by Manav Gupta
Times of India
Page One, Delhi Times, Times of India
June 13, 2010
By Suruchi Sharma
If you visit the sprawling Bharti Cellular office at Gurgaon, be ready to be pleasantly surprised by a five storey high magnum opus – a painting.
As you enter, you’ll be greeted by the 5,000-square-foot Tree of Life right in the centre of the building, showcasing the five elements of nature.
Painted by Manav Gupta, this mega mural, formally inaugurated this week, is a first of its kind piece of art – in Delhi at least. And it took Manav (with a good dose of help from the employees, whose office it is, of course) just two months to finish the project. It took more than a 1,000 employees, investing some 2,000 man-hours, and around 400 cans of acrylic paint and preservatives to give a lovely structure to a blank five storey staircase.
Ask Manav as to how the project came about and he says, “I used to do jugalbandis between art, music and poetry. This time, I thought of bringing the spontaneity of the masses to the fore, and that’s how I thought of collaborative art.” He adds, “I could have created the mural alone, but I wanted the involvement of the employees. Each person who has contributed even so much as a brush stroke would have a sense of bonding with the huge space. Their learning and their experience would be unique – something they would carry back with them.”But how were so many employees told how to make an artistic whole? Manav says he’d allot them spaces to paint. Sometimes he guided them, sometimes they were asked to go wild with figures. “The concept was challenging but at the same time creative, as each person was with his/her unique thought. Some wanted to paint bleeding hearts, some wanted to paint books or rangoli,” says Manav. And how did he ensure that all they painted looked like one artwork at the end of the day? “The employees would come between 11 am and 5 pm. After they left, I worked on their art, transforming multifarious hues, shapes, colours and idioms into a composite mega canvas that spoke one language,” says Manav. The mural shows the five elements of nature, one on each floor. The ‘Tree of life,’ a symbol of earth, on first floor; the ‘Peacock’ on second, symbolising water and celebration; a horizon and ‘Leaves’ on the third, denoting air; an introspecting ‘Gaze’ on the fourth, as a symbol of space; and the ‘Glow’ on the fifth denoting fire. The employees are all too happy with the result. “What we have created is a masterpiece and I can proudly say that I am a part of it,” says Manish Khare.
The Tree of Life is the Tallest and the Largest Indoor Staircase Mural
Limca Book of Records
Page-126
ISBN 978-93-82867-00-5
Artist Manav Gupta’s Tree of Life at Airtel Centre, Gurgaon, is the tallest and the largest indoor staircase mural measuring approximately, 5,000 square feet in view and 10,000 sq ft in its entire dimensions.
He used multiple processes in conceptual art, site-specific art, collaborative art and performance art, visible all over the campus through a 60 ft high glass facade across five floors as a single canvas merging surrounding sides and roof into one composition. Further, Gupta guided all 3,500 employees at the site to put strokes and idioms on his artwork in the initial half of the project. The second half of the project involved weaving, merging and continuing his marathon two-month performance art practice alone; live.
The mural tells the story of consistent innovation.
Thousands Of Hands, One Mural
The Hindu
By Ankita Dhyani
Sep 03, 2010
A five-storey-high mural now adorns the Airtel Centre campus in Gurgaon If you thought creativity is place discerning and you would find a magnificent piece of art only in an art exhibition, think again; for a walk through the Airtel Centre, Gurgaon, will clear all such notions.
A five-storey-high mural on the sprawling Airtel campus is a superlative artwork. What makes it unique is not only the massive size but the fact that it has been painted by around 3,500 Airtel employees, under the supervision of acclaimed artist Manav Gupta.
When Airtel recently brought together all its business verticals under one roof, the HR team came forth with this idea of nurturing collective employee engagement.
“The creation of this mega mural is a symbol of the collaborative spirit and innovative minds of our employees. The art work is symbolic of the Airtel brand, which is multi-dimensional and innovative. It captures the core values of our company and manages to highlight” the “One Airtel” spirit,” says Krish Shankar, Director of HR.Employees and senior management were equally enthusiastic about this initiative. Even Sunil Mittal, Chairman and MD of Bharti Group, contributed by giving a final stroke to the mural. For some it was a first-time experience with the paintbrush and colour, while for some it was a trip down memory lane. “Coming out of our mundane lifestyle and imprinting the wall was not only refreshing but also strengthened our bond with our workplace,” beams Upasana Bhurani, an employee. Artist Manav Gupta, renowned for his earlier works of ‘jugalbandi’ or collaborative art, was commissioned by Airtel for this project. According to Gupta, “It was a challenging yet soul-nourishing experience. Painting with 3,500 people for three months and moulding it all into one structure was a complex task.”
Tree of Life
Air India | Namaskaar
August 2010
Namaskaar
Air India Magazine
NAVNEET MENDIRATTA
MANAV GUPTA believes in taking up challenges. His 5000 sq. ft. tall and six floor high masterpiece at the Airtel office in Gurgaon is a fine proof of his romance with jugalbandi and interactive art. He paints to the strains of live music. His brush strokes glide across the canvas in fluid movements as poetry translates into images and soon the white of the base is splashed with myriad colours, It's a jugalbandi of sorts - between art and music/poetry, one that takes public art to another level where music and words find their visual representation. For artist Manav Gupta, it is the way art must be done. Breaking the shackles of iconoclastic and flowing into open spaces undefined by any parameters, challenging the mind to create something extraordinary. It was perhaps the dare to take up another challenge and create something different that made Gupta turn his commissioned assignment into a public involvement. He transformed a stark wall at the Airtel Campus in Gurgaon, running up six floors, broken by staircases and balustrades into a masterpiece called The Life Tree, in a little over two months. "Then, I had over 1,000 Airtel employees helping me in the effort for about a month," he chuckles. Help was as good as free art - doodles, graffiti and patches of colours - splashed across the 500 sq ft high space available at hand. A little hard to imagine when there are no instructions given on the concept apart from the general missive that no part must be left uncovered. It was the sheer joy of them coming and being a part of the masterpiece that had them excited and charged enough to turn out in huge numbers and participate. "For one month, from nine to five, it was a free for all, and then till 11 in the night, I would be running from one floor to the other and across the building, working on weaving the piece together," he recalls. The other month was spent "fine-tuning" the creation. But what came out was nothing short of pure magic. A tree that wove Nature's five elements, firmly rooted to the base, rising and raising with it thoughts and impressions that nudge and define life. Shoots growing into strong branches, the umbilical cord that continues to hold key to our attachments and the penetrating gaze that observes life as given to us, introspects and reflects the essence of being. And then the feeling of space that translates into the freedom of mind, having understood the eternal truth of life... "You cannot alienate art from people and expect them to find meaning in it. There must exist a certain degree of involvement for them to understand, get excited about and bond with the creation. And this is the crux behind creating public art," says Gupta. Incidentally, this is not the first time that Gupta has taken up a challenge like this. He has firmly established himself as a pioneer of interactive art. One who translated former President APJ Abdul Kalam's poems into a series of painting to be woven into a book. Before that, he put together a series of documentaries for the Department of Environment, translating his own poems into works of art sending out a strong message to act timely. His jugalbandis with classical music maestros like Dr L Subramaniam, Rahul Sharma and Rakesh Chaurasia have won him accolades and he's often invited to participate in collaborative art endeavours. "But then that is how it is. Art can never exist solely on its own. It is influenced by almost everything around you," he says. For someone who redefined the gallery space, he should know. "I held my first painting exhibition in a garden outside a gallery in Kolkata when no one thought about it. It was my first solo and a sheer chance that the indoor space was booked. They only had their park to offer. In those days no one hosted shows in open spaces, I chose to do it differently," he smiles. For someone, who is equally comfortable with watercolours as he is with acrylic and oil on canvas, his work finds a lot of patronage in corporate houses and institutions. Many of his paintings have been auctioned by Christie's in London and he likes to get attached and work towards a cause. "It lends a sense of fulfillment and gives me an identity," he says, one that sets him apart from the crowd.
Indian artist brings his trilogy here
The Des Moines Register | Iowa Life
Internationally acclaimed Manav Gupta's show at D.M. Social Club to include collaborative art event.
By MICHAEL MORAIN
Artist Manav Gupta asked employees of a telecommunications firm near New Delhi, India, to help paint a multi-story mural, called "Tree of Life," at the company's office building.
One of India's leading artists is displaying his work in Des Moines this week, between high-profile exhibitions in London, Berlin and other stops on a tour sponsored by the Indian government. The "traveling trilogy," as Manav Gupta calls it, consists of nature-based paintings on display through Saturday at the Des Moines Social Club, a series of one-minute videos he developed to promote environmental awareness, and a collaborative painting performance he'll lead in the gallery on Friday night. Gupta "Art that just hangs on the walls is not enough. Art can do so much more," said the poet/philosopher/painter, who ranks among the international Financial Times' "top 10 contemporary artists of India whose works fetch good returns" and whose work has been auctioned off at Christie's. The Social Club's gallery is decidedly more humble than some of the other venues on his tour, but he seems delighted with his first visit to Iowa, a result of his connections to Register columnist Rekha Basu's family in New Delhi. He knows her mother and has illustrated some of her late father's books. "Des Moines has a soul to it," he said last week. "I love it." Gupta travels on his own and carries his artwork with him, so he's limited to small works on paper, mostly abstract watercolors, and several larger unframed works that he can roll up "Many Faces, One World," for example, which he created to symbolize spiritual links between various con-tinents, is painted on an ordinary piece of fabric. The artist's best-known talent, though, is his knack for creating on-site. Here in Des Moines, he's inviting visitors to help him paint a canvas in a creative process he calls jugalbandi, from the Hindi word for "collaboration." "They'll come in and paint for me, and then I'll weave it together," he said. "In the process, people can experience the ecstasy of working with color and letting their emotions go." It's the same kind of teamwork he directed for a much larger project earlier this year, a six-story mural in an office building in India. For a month, thousands of employees painted various scenes and doodles - whatever they liked - before Gupta pulled it all together into a cohesive image he titled "Tree of Life." "We had 3,500 people just come and pick up brushes," he said. "I let them go ber-serk. I let them go completely free, which meant a tougher task for me ... but it was great fun."
'Trilogy'
With a collaborative painting performance by Manav Gupta
WHEN: 7 p.m. Friday
WHERE: Des Moines Social Club, 1408 Locust St,
ADMISSION: Free
INFO: (515) 288-3672, desmoinessocialclub.org
Manav Gupta | A President's Artist
Hi Blitz
August 10th, 2016
Hi Blitz | Volume 14 | Issue 9
Cover Feature: Manav Gupta- A President’s Artist | On the Waterfront.
Manav Gupta slips from the spoken word to painted brush strokes. He flows from country to country while crossing creative spaces and borders with his innovative art style.
He lays down what he sees through his paintings and his installations, breathing nature back into the life of the modern individual with two decades worth of art. Born to literati, Manav took to poetry at an early age. Often, he would create paintings for the book covers of his literati parents and several poets he came to know over time. He even made a few book-covers for IK Gujral (former prime minster of India) and Sheila Gujral. Such book covers intrigued the interest of the 11* President of India, Dr Kalam. It was on his request that Gupta translated his poem, A National Prayer, into a painting. The result of this collaboration impressed Dr Kalam and thus initiated a long and dear friendship.
Being the first artist in residence with the late former President, Dr Kalam, Gupta tells us about spending many an ambient evening composing together. “Every morning we used to take walks together talking about everything under the sun, science, politics, more of art and music. He used to play the Veena, so we used to sit at night, he used to play, and I used to paint or sketch.
Those used to be great weekend trysts with destiny. Somewhere along the way the artist was riveted by the power of clay lamps and it became the raison d’etre for his powerful installations series Excavations in Hymns of Clay.
In this avant-garde series he deconstructs kullars, chilums and diyas and uses them in his installations to portray rivers, rain and other forms of environmental art At his exhibit in Delhi’s Red Fort called the Waterfront he placed a few twigs upright in the flowing river of inverted diyas; in four months the twigs blossomed and it is his strong belief that the blossoming is the result of the power of thought.
He invited several children to play in the clay river made of diyas and on breaking a couple they immediately regretted destroying art. Gupta impresses upon us that we should feel the same about harming the environment as we do about artwork. He remarked how in South Africa people would sit by his Shrinking River exhibit and ponder, simply absorbing the silence.
“Nature has a million answers. If one submits oneself to the form and the raw energy of the tree, one can see great poetry and lyricism in its intertwining branches and roots.”
His dedication to environmental issues prompted collaborations with the Ministry of Environment where he made one-minute films for them about ecosystems, climate change and sustainable development. His poetic paintings are a pleasure to behold. The Lyrics of Light, one of his signature series gives you a sense of honesty in his play with chiaroscuro. His works come in many shapes and sizes and forms.
You must be logged in to post a comment.