Record

CodeDS/UK/532
Person NameGupta; Sunil (1953-); Photographer, curator, archivist, HIV+ activist, teacher
Dates1953-
Dates and Places1953 Born New Delhi, India
1969 Moved to Montreal, Canada
1976 Studied photography at New School, New York
1981 Graduated from West Surrey College of Art and Design
1983 Received MA from Royal College of Art
2004-2012 Returned to live in India
2019 Received PhD from University of Westminster
HistoryGupta was born in New Delhi, moved to Montreal in 1969, then New York when he was 23. He was educated in photography at the New School in New York in 1976. He received a diploma from West Surrey College of Art and Design in 1981. He got an MA from the Royal College of Art in 1983. in 2019 he completed a PhD from University of Westminster. His thesis is titled 'Queer Migrations'. Much of his work involves themes of India, his homeland. His work also is interwoven with his identity as queer. His roots are in street photography. Gupta set out to engage with "a form of liberal photojournalism". In the 1980s he was a leading figure in Black British photography. He consciously avoids his work becoming touristic or ethnographic. Gupta weaves a sense of disconnection within the diasporic experience throughout his work. He was diagnosed as HIV positive in the mid 1990s. His experiences of being gay and HIV positive feature in his work. Gupta returned to live in India between 2004 and 2012. There he photographed the local queer community. His experiences with migration largely influence his work.
ActivityEXHIBITIONS – SOLO

2023 The New Pre-Raphaelites, Hales, New York
2023 Songs of Deliverance, Charing Cross Hospital, London
2022 Cruising, Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi
2022 Arrival, Fierce Festival, Birmingham (with Charan Singh)
2022 Sunil Gupta: From Here to Eternity, Ryerson Image Centre, Toronto
2022 Songs of Deliverance, Parts 1&2, Main Foyer, Charing Cross Hospital, London and Cambridge Wing Gallery, St. Mary’s Hospital, London, + Studio Voltaire
2021-2022 The New Pre-Raphaelites, Holburne, Museum, Bath
2021 Black Experience, Hales, London
2021 Christopher Street , Matèria, Rome
2020 Sunil Gupta: From Here to Eternity, The Photographers' Gallery, London
2020 Brixton Tate Library, London with Charan Singh
2019 Christopher Street, Hales Gallery, New York
2019 The Politics of Images, Brixton Tate Library, London (with Charan Singh)
2018 Friends & Lovers: Coming Out in Montréal in the 1970s, Stephen Bulger Gallery
2018 Dissent and Desire, Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston (with Charan Singh)
2017 Sunil Gupta: In Pursuit of Love, Pelz Gallery, University of London
2017 Delhi: Communities of Belonging, Diffusion, Cardiff Photo Festival (with Charan Singh)
2017 Delhi: Communities of Belonging, SepiaEye, New York (with Charan Singh)
2015 Queer Migrations, Whitney Humanities Centre, Yale University
2014 Sunil Gupta: Out and About in New York and New Delhi, Sepia Eye, New York
2012 Sun City & Other Stories Alliance Francaise Gallery, New Delhi
2010 The New Pre-Raphaelites, Aberdeen Art Gallery, Aberdeen
2010 The New Pre-Raphaelites, Grosvenor Vadehra, London
2009 Love, Undetectable, Vadehra Art Gallery, Delhi
2009 Imagining Childhood, Sepia, New York
2009 Mr Malhotra's Party, Stephen Bulger, Toronto
2007 Homelands & Tales of a City, Belfast Exposed, Belfast
2007 Sunil Gupta, Bombay Art Gallery, Mumbai
2006 Imagining Childhood: Living with HIV in Delhi, College of Saten Island, New York
2006 Looking for Langston (with Isaac Julien), Metro Pictures, New York
2005 Sunil Gupta, Canadian Museum for Contemporary Photography, Ottawa
2004 Pictures From Here, John Hansard Gallery, Southampton
2004 Homelands​ California Museum of Photography, UC Riverside
2004 Homelands, Sepia International, New York
2004 Homelands, Stephen Bulger Gallery, Toronto
2004 Pictures From Here, London Print Studio
2004 Pictures From Here, India Habitat Centre, New Delhi
2004 Tales of A City - Delhi, Lighthouse, Poole
1997 Trespass 3, Bedford Hill Gallery, London
1997 Trespass 3, Portfolio, Edinburgh
1996 Trespass 3, YYZ, Toronto
1995 Trespass 3, Focal Point Gallery, Southend
1994 Trespass 3, Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver
1991 Film in the Cities, St Paul, Minnesota (USA)
1991 Theatre Workshop, Edinburgh (Festival)
1988 Social Security, The Showroom, London
1986 Leica Gallery, Wetzlar
1986 South Hill Park, Bracknell
1984 Museum & Art Galleries, Leicester
1984 Museum & Art Galleries, Nottingham
1984 UN International Maritime Organisation, London
1983 Commonwealth Institute, London
1980 India International Centre, New Delhi

EXHIBITIONS - GROUP (SELECTED)

2023 The World that Belongs to Us, New Art Gallery, Walsall
2023 Indian Photography, Trieste
2023 Finding Family, Foundling Museum, London
2023 Queer Love, Lehman College Art Gallery, New York
2023 The Rosettis, Tate Britain, London
2023 Wink Wink, The Whitaker Museum, Rossendale
2022/2023 Pop South Asia: Artistic Explorations in the Popular, Sharjah Art Foundation/Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, New Delhi
2022 Every Moment Counts: AIDS and its Feelings, Henie Onstad Kunstsenter, Oslo
2022 The London Open, Whitechapel Gallery, London
2022 Seen, Newlyn Art Gallery & The Exchange, Newlyn
2022 May You of a Better Future, Trafalgar Avenue, London
2021 The Gaze, TJ Boulting, London
2021 Mercury Rising, Schwules Museum, Berlin
2021 The Third Gender- diversity is more, Alfons Kern Tower, Pforzheim
2021 Sweat, Haus der Kunst, Munich
2021 On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, Jhaveri Contemporary, Mumbai
2021 Masculinities, Arles Festival
2021 Masculinities, FOMU, Antwerp
2020 Masculinities, Gropius Bau, Berlin
2020 Masculinities, Barbican Art Gallery, London
2019 Moving Still: Performative Photography from India, Vancouver Art Gallery
2019 Photography After Stonewall, Soho Photo Gallery, New York
2019 Art After Stonewall, Leslie-Lohman Museum, New York
2019 Hyphen, Ambika P3, University of Westminster, London
2018 Vision Exchange: Perspectives from India to Canada​​, Art Gallery of Alberta (tour to Art Museum at Univ. of Toronto​, the Winnipeg Art Gallery, the MacKenzie Art Gallery in Regina and the National Gallery in Ottawa until 2020.
2018 Re-present: Photography from South Asia, Kamploops Art Gallery
2018 Dissent and Desire, Kochi Muziris Biennale, India (with Charan Singh)
2017 In Your Face Salisbury Arts Centre
2017 The Place is Here Nottingham Contemporary/Middlesborough Institute of Modern Art
2016 Clifford Chance, New York
2016 The Human Document, Mead Gallery, Warwick Arts Centre, Coventry
2016 Fotobiennale Odense, Denmark
2015 I am a Camera, Fotofest, Houston
2015 Picture This: Contemporary Photography from India, Philadelphia Museum of Art
2015 Safe, Home, Manchester
2015 GFest, Menier Gallery, London
2014 My Sweet Lord, 1x1 Gallery, Dubai
2014 Sunil Gupta, Magdalen College, Oxford
2014 Keywords, Tate, Liverpool
2014 Love AIDS Riot Sex-2, NGBK, Berlin
2013 Keywords, Iniva, London
2013 001-91+001-92, Art Gallery of Mississauga, Ontario, Canada
2012 Indian Highway, Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing
2012 Clifford Chance Annual Pride Exhibition, London
2012 The World in London, The Photographers’ Gallery, London
2012 2012: A Further Global Encounter, Grosvenor/Vadehra, London
2011 Indian Highway, Musée d’Art Contemporain, Lyon & MAXXI, Rome
2011 The Matter Within New Contemporary Art of India, Yerba Buena, San Fransisco
2011 Paris-Delhi-Bombay... Centre Pompidou, Paris
2011 Something I've Been Meaning To Tell You, Vadehara Art Gallery, New Delhi
2011 Women in Love, Ashna Gallery, New Delhi
2010 Face-Up, Vadehara Art Gallery, New Delhi
2009 Self and the Other, Espai 2 - Palau de la Virreina, Barcelona
2009 En todas partes (Everywhere), Centro Galego de Arte Contemporánea, Santiago de Compostela, Spain
2009 Sh(OUT) Gallery of Modern Art, Glasgow
2009 Vadehra Art Gallery at ARCO, Madrid
2008 Make Art/Stop AIDS, Fowler Museum, UCLA, Los Angeles
2008 Pride, Clifford Chance, London
2008 Modern India, Valencian Institute of Modern Art, Valencia
2008 By All Means, Thomas Erben Gallery, Scpe Basel, Basel
2008 Street & Studio, Tate Modern, London
2008 Masculinities, Jawarharlal Nehru University, Delhi
2007 Photo London, London
2007 Photoespaña, Madrid
2007 Quietscapes, Museeo Carrilo Gill, Mexico City
2007 Les Rancontres d'Arles, Arles
2007 Public Places/Private Spaces, Newark Museum, Newark
2007 Gill & Gupta, India International Centre, Delhi
2007 Horn Please, Kunstmuseum, Bern
2006 Making Journeys, Djanogly Art Gallery, Nottingham
2006 The Eigth Square, Museum Ludwig, Cologne
2004 Faces in the Crowd, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London
2004 Invalid, Stephen Lawrence Gallery, London
1997/98 Transforming the Crown, Caribbean Cultural Centre, New York
1994 Havana Biennial, Ludwig Forum, Aachen
1994 Havana Biennial, Cuba
1993 They Call it Love, NGBK, Berlin
1992/3 Trophies of Empire, Arnolfini, Bristol & Ferens Art Gallery, Hull
1992 Fine Material for a Dream, Harris Museum, Preston & Touring (Hull,Oldham)
1992 How Do I Look?, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane & Touring
1992 Queer Landscape, Evergreen State College, Olympia (Washington State)
1992 Dis/Orient, UIC Gallery 400, Chicago
1991 Shocks to the System, The South Bank Centre, London
1990 Post Morality, Kettle's Yard, Cambridge
1990 Autoportraits, Camerawork, London
1990 Ecstatic Antibodies, Impressions Gallery of Photography, York (Tour)
1989 Fabled Territories, Leeds City Art Gallery (Tour)
1989 Partners in Crime, Camerawork, London
1989 Through the Looking Glass, Barbican Gallery, London
1988 Monologue/Dialogue, Randolph Street Gallery, Chicago
1987 The Body Politic, The Photographers' Gallery, London (Tour)
1986 Same Difference, Camerawork, London
1986 Darshan, GLC/ Camerawork, London
1986 The Black Experience, Brixton Art Gallery
1985 Riverside Open, Riverside Studios, London
1985 Staying On, The Photographers' Gallery, London
1984 Five Dials Gallery, London
1984 Brilliance Books, People's Gallery, London
1983 Snap, Oval House, London
1983 New Contemporaries, ICA, London
1982 The Living Arts, Serpentine Gallery, London
1980 Contemporary Colour Photography, Salford '80, Salford

EXHIBITION COMMISSIONS

2022 Arrival, Fierce Festival, Birmingham (a collaboration with Charan Singh)
2020 Songs of Deliverance, Parts 1&2, Studio Voltaire/Imperial Health Trust, London
2010 Sun City, Pompidou Centre, Paris
1999 From Here ot Eternity, Autograph-ABP, London
1995 Trespass 3, Essex Photography Fellowship, Focal Point Gallery, AUTOGRAPH-ABP
1992 Trespass 1, TROPHIES OF EMPIRE; Arnolfini, Bluecoat, Ferens Art Gallery
1990 Autoportraits, Autograph
1989 No Solutions. Ecstatic Antibodies
1988 Social Security, The Showroom/Canada House
1987 Exiles,THE BODY POLITIC, The Photographers' Gallery
1986 Reflections of the Black Experience, GLC / Brixton Art Gallery
1985 Notting Hill Carnival, Arts Council

RESIDENCIES

2021-2022 Studio Voltaire, London
2021 La Becque, Switzerland

FILM & VIDEO

2014 London Gay Switchboard, fragment of Tape/Slide installation
2012 The Alice Stories #1, “I Stay Here, You Stay There”, artist’s video
2009 Love, Undetectable #11,12,13, Artist’s videos
2009 I Want to Live, for Human Right Law Network/Sociol Legal Information Centre
2004 Stuart Hall on Photography, Interview with Stuart Hall
2004 Sarindar Dhaliwal: Record Keeping, Documentary about artist’s work produced and authored as DVD
2004 Decibel, Documentary on the work of the Arts Council of England’s project on Diversity in the Visual Arts in the UK
2003 (A World Without) Pity, Artist’s video, AHRB funded, University of Southampton
2002 Wong Hoy Cheong: Indigenous Skins, Documentary about artist’s work produced and authored as DVD
2001 Joy Gregory: Cinderella Stories, Documentary about artist’s work produced and authored as DVD
2000 Seven Days in May, Artist’s video
1991/1992 Cock Crazy or Scared Stiff, co-directed with Laura MacGregor for Avid Productions Leicester
1989/1990 deSouza Commissioned to make a short, 8 min film by Abseil Productions for the series Out on Tuesday; a profile of the artist Alan de Souza;
1988/1989 India Postcard Commissioned to make a short, 4 min., film by Abseil Productions, aired on Channel 4 in March 1989;
1987 Original photographs used in This is not an Aids advertisement by Isaac Julien / Sankofa Film & Video

CURATION

India, Houston Fotofest (with Steven Evans) 2018
A Photograph is Not an Opinion - Contemporary Photography by Women, Focus Festival, Mumbai 2013
Something I've Been Meaning to Tell You, Vadehara Art Gallery, New Delhi 2011
Photographing the Metropoliton, Max Muellar Bhawan-Goethe Institute, New Delhi 2011
Where Three Dreams Cross: Photography from India, Pakistan & Bangladesh, (with Radhika Singh, Hammad Nasser and Shahidul Alam) Whitechapel Art Gallery, London 2010
Click! The Indian Photograph, (with Radhika Singh) Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi 2008
Relative Values: Contemporary Indian Photography, (with Radhika Singh) John Hansard Gallery, University of Southampton UK 2007
Autoportraits, Nigah Queer Festival, New Delhi 2007.
Sarindar Dhaliwal, John Hansard Gallery, Southampton & Touring 2004/05
Roshini Kempadoo, City Art Gallery, Leicester & Touring 2004/05
Wong Hoy Cheong, Bluecoat, Liverpool & Touring 2002/3
Joy Gregory: Cinderella Stories, London & Touring2001
Stevie Bezencenet: Wilderness Dreams, London 2000
Jane Alexander, Gasworks, London 2000
Simryn Gill, Bluecoat, Liverpool, 1999 & touring.
The New Republics: Contemporary Art from Australia, Canada & South Africa, Canada House Gallery, London, 1999 & touring.
Fernando Arias, Chapter, Cardiff, 1998 & touring.
Divine Façades: Views of Indian Architecture, Impressions, York, 1997 & touring.
Transitions—The Bath Festival 1995 contemporary work from South Africa.
Sometime/s — Johannesburg Biennale 1995
Stan Douglas, OVA/INIVA/ICA, London 1994
Hiram To, OVA/INIVA/Camden Arts Centre, London 1994 & Touring
Disrupted Borders, OVA/INIVA/The Photographers’ Gallery & Arnolfini 1993 & Touring
Powers of Perception, London Borough of Lewisham, 1991
Autoportraits, (with Monika Baker) for Autograph Exhibitions, 1989/90
Fabled Territories, City Art Gallery, Leeds & Viewpoint, Salford, 1989
An Economy of Signs, (with Radhika Singh) The Photographers' Gallery, London, 1988/90
Partners in Crime, Camerawork, London 1988/89
Ecstatic Antibodies (with Tessa Boffin), Impressions Gallery & Touring 1988/90
Same Difference, (with Jean Fraser), Camerawork, 1986

BOOKS

2023 Come Out, Stanley Barker, London
2022 We Were Here: Sexuality, Photography, and Cultural Difference, Aperture, New York
2021 London 1982, Stanley Barker, London
2020 Sunil Gupta: From Here to Eternity, Autograph, London
2020 Lovers: Ten Years On, Stanley Barker, London
2018 Christopher Street 1976, Stanley Barker, Edinburgh
2016 Delhi: Communities of Belonging, The New Press, New York (with Charan Singh)
2011 Queer: Sunil Gupta, Vadehra Art Gallery/Prestel
2008 Wish You Were Here, Yoda Press, New Delhi
2003 Pictures From Here, (Ed. Chris Boot) Autograph/Chris Boot, London
2000 Exiles, self published catalogue, London
2000 From Here to Eternity, London
1998 Sunil Gupta/Trespass, Autograph, London
1993 Disrupted Borders, (Ed) Rivers Oram Press, London & Boston
1990 An Economy of Signs, (Ed) Rivers Oram Press, London & Boston
1990 Ecstatic Antibodies: Resisting the Aids Mythology, (Ed. with Tessa Boffin), Rivers Oram Press, London
RelationshipsTessa Boffin, Co-curator, 'Ecstatic Antibodies: Resisting the AIDS Mythology', 1990
Kaucyila Brooke, Collaborator, 'Partners in Crime', Camerawork, 1989
Hinda Schuman, Collaborator, 'Partners in Crime'', Camerawork, 1989
Doug Ischar, Collaborator, 'Partners in Crime', Camerawork, 1989
Jean Fraser, Co-curator, Same Difference, Camerawork, 1986
Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Co-founder, Autograph, 1988
Monica Baker, Co-founder, Autograph, 1988
Merle Van den Bosch, Co-founder, Autograph, 1988
Pratibha Parmar, Co-founder, Autograph, 1988
Ingrid Pollard, Co-founder, Autograph, 1988
Roshini Kempadoo, Co-founder, Autograph, 1988
Armet Francis, Co-founder, Autograph, 1988
SourceDunster, Flora, 'Do You Have Place? A Coversation with Sunil Gupta', Third Text, 35.1 (2021) pp. 81-95.
Sternberger, Paul, 'Me, Myself and India: Contemporary Indian Photography and the Diasporic Experience', Photographies, 2.1 (2009) pp. 37-58.
Bissonauth, 'A Camping of Orientalism in Sunil Gupta's "Sun City"', Art Journal, 78.4 (2019) pp. 98-117.
Bush, Kate, Coustou, Elsa , Raza, Nada, 'Sunil Gupta: David and Peter, London', Art and Artists, Tate, March 2014, updated December 2017, <https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/gupta-david-peter-london-p82125> [accessed 7 February 2024].
'Sunil Gupta', Hales Gallery, <https://halesgallery.com/artists/91-sunil-gupta/overview/> [accessed 7 February 2024].
'Sunil Gupta', Stephen Bulger Gallery, <https://www.bulgergallery.com/artists/25-sunil-gupta/biography/> [accessed 7 February 2024].
Catalogue
RefNoTitle
CPG/2/14'Armet Francis: The Black Triangle: The people of the African Diaspora', [Cockpit Gallery Holborn, Feb 1985]
CWA/2/2/20Zarina Bhimji, Prodeepta Das, Ashwin Gatha, Sunil Gupta, Sunil Janah, Mumtaz Karimjee, Abida Khan, Samina Khanour, Sarita Sharm, Padma Shreshtha: Darshan - Ten Asian Photographers, 1987
CWA/2/2/49Kaucyila Beooke, Hinda Schuman, Doug Ischar, Sunil Gupta: Partners in Crime, 25 August - 30 September, 1989
CWA/2/2/58Monika Baker, Allan de Souza, Rotimi Fani-Kayode, Joy Gregory, Sunil Gupta, Lyle Harris, Mumtaz Karimjee, Roshini Kempadoo: Autoportraits, 20 March - 12 April, 1990
CWA/2/3/1Exhibition Reviews, 1986-1988
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