Sumit Sarkar

Sumit Sarkar is a NorthWest based visual artist, whose character based artwork takes the form of digital paintings, canvas paintings, digital sculpture, and aerosol art. The content of work ranges from the fantastical characters of Sumit's KrikSix world, to his modern interpretation of the Hindu gods. Sumit Sarkar also works as a designer, illustrator and workshop leader, and is involved in various live art events around the UK. He has exhibited in and around Manchester, with solo exhibitions at Cornerhouse, Contact Theatre and Creative Consultants Gallery & Art Lounge and joint exhibitions with various Manchester artists from Spearfish, Doodlebug, Sketch City and Ink Tank.

www.kriksix.com

Throughout 2008 Sumit Sarkar was in residence at Lanternhouse, developing Ananta, bringing together the artist’s deep personal knowledge and understanding of the Hindu pantheon and its theology with his desire to re-imagine its iconography for a modern age. 

The Ananta exhibition took place at Lanternhouse in the spring of 2009 and was a huge success. Thousands of visitors came to see the amazing digital creations created by Sumit. Images from the exhibition can be viewed here.

Hundreds of local schoolchildren came along and joined in the school workshops. Many families attended the family workshops linked to the exhibition. The feedback was very positive with visitors describing the exhibition as "breathtakingly beautiful" and "very inspiring". Sumit also helped pass on some of his new technical skills.

In partnership with arts organisation art locates me, Lanternhouse ran six workshops for young people aged 14-18 years to learn how to create their own models in 3D digitally. The work the young people made and the skills they gained were impressive.

The Ananta Exhibition toured around the UK, with shows in Durham and Leamington Spa. We are really pleased to have shared Sumit's work with a whole new set of audiences across the UK. 

As a result of his residency, during which he developed his skills with Blender, the open source, cross platform suite of tools for 3D creation, Sumit was also invited to contribute an article to folly's Digital Artists' Handbook. You can read his article, Blender: Working with 3d at the handbook website.

Images by Sumit Sarkar