Beneath the Turning Sky: Museum of Art and Photography’s exhibition provokes reflection on our world
In this photo essay, we feature highlights from the permanent exhibition at MAP in Bengaluru.
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The Museum of Art and Photography (MAP) has unveiled a permanent exhibition titled Beneath the Turning Sky, exploring how we humans find our place in the vast, ever-changing universe. See our coverage of earlier exhibitions at this popular Bengaluru culture hub here.
The thought-provoking exhibition traces our enduring search for meaning, and our attempts to understand the cosmos. It raises questions around how our choices shape the world, our communities, and all others with whom we share the planet. This ranges from creation myths to the technologies shaping our future.
The exhibition spans three sections – Wonder; Exploration & Conquest; and Future, Present. The well-curated exhibition features over 60 works by artists such as VS Gaitonde, SH Raza, Arpita Singh, and many others.
They include illustrated manuscript folios from medieval India, sculptures, installations, and interactive exhibits. They invite reflection on how humans have come to view and dominate the world, and what our responsibility and relationships to the planet ought to be in the future.
Viewing the exhibition back and forth is like going through a time tunnel of periods, regions and mediums. Paintings, photographs, textiles, pop culture, and living traditions reinforce how humankind has interpreted the world through story, imagination, introspection, and conquest.
Human art has served and evolved as a record of how we perceive reality—not just visually, but philosophically, spiritually and emotionally. For example, early cave art portrayed humans as deeply embedded in nature, and not as separate forms.
Later on, views of the world in art became tied to power, sprituality and religion. Creative methods evolved to reflect balance, harmony, and idealised beauty, with the human body becoming central.
Analog and digital technology have added new dimensions to art and its depiction of the world. Numerous genres of art have been spawned, particularly in the last three centuries. The colonial era added new dimensions of power dynamics in art as well.
From the Vedic period onwards, Indian art has reflected other philosophical foundations of culture. For example, there is a strong focus on interconnectedness, unification, ritual, and revelation.
Over the centuries, divine forces were represented in art with human embodiment, and multiple arms, heads and objects conveyed dimensions of power. Art also reflected serenity, detachment and enlightenment on the one hand, while capturing intimacy, love and surrender on the other.
Indian artists today navigate multiple worlds simultaneously—ancient philosophy, colonial history, and global modernity. Reality is seen as not just external—it is inner, symbolic and interconnected.
While addressing these themes, the MAP exhibition has a strong focus on tactile experiences that encourage visitors to explore materials and textures. In addition to viewing shape and colour, physical touch and auditory consoles add a new dimension to the experience.
There is also a dedicated engagement hub that poses questions to visitors, gives them books to browse, and invites submission of answers on the walls of the room. The show has a companion publication that extends these questions and reflections through essays by experts. They include GN Devy, Harini Nagendra, Ira Mukhoty, and Ranjit Hoskote. There is also a children’s publication created specifically for young audiences.
“With Beneath the Turning Sky, we invite you to reflect on the past, root ourselves in the present, and imagine the futures ahead of us. To remember how small and yet significant we are – participants and stewards, shaped by the land that sustains us,” curator Priya Chauhan signs off.
Now what have you done today to pause in your busy schedule and harness your creative side for a better world?
(All photographs taken by Madanmohan Rao on location at MAP.)