Hyderabad: The India Art Festival (IAF) that returns to the city this weekend will offer a dense and unhurried space to encounter art from across the country.
Slated to be held at Kings Crown Convention in Rethi Bowli from April 4 to 6, the fair will feature over 3,500 works of master artists, mid-career names and newcomers spread over 100 booths. From Laxma Goud’s inkworks to Kantha Reddy’s sculptures and more will all be on exhibit at IAF 2025.
Hyderabad may be relatively new to this fair with this being its second edition. The festival has seen fifteen years in Mumbai, ten years in Delhi, and five years in Bengaluru.
Galleries from each of these cities are returning. So are those from Singapore, Pune, Baroda and Panipat.
Rajendra Patil, who pioneered IAF in Mumbai 15 years back, describes it as a public space and not a commercial one.
“When it started in 2010, it was about giving people access to art they don’t normally get to see and rejoice in. Hyderabad doesn’t lack talent but lacks public platforms,” he said.
Patil pointed out that many emerging artists across the country, even after graduating from art schools, find themselves locked out of galleries.
“There are two lakh practicing artists. How many galleries can show them? Not enough. That’s where this comes in,” he points out on the importance of having exhibitions like IAF.
Walking through the Hyderabad edition will mean encountering three generations of artistic practice, sometimes within a single aisle.
Patil calls it a ‘one-roof’ experience, a phrase less about convenience than contrast with print, digital, sculpture, mixed media, and paintings of every conceivable size all in one place.
Live painting sessions will break the frame further. Bhaskar Rao, among others, is expected to create a work in front of the audience.
While booths offer finished work, even the process is on display. Classical music will run parallel to create a mesmerising visual-auditory dialogue.
A 70-minute film titled ‘The Eternal Canvas’ will be screened during the festival. Retracing 12,000 years of Indian art history, it moves from cave walls to contemporary studios.
This year’s participants include the likes of Jogen Chowdhury, Manu Parekh, Seema Kohli, T Vaikuntam, Krishen Khanna, Anjoli Ela Menon, Yusuf Arakkal, Ramesh Gorjala, Lalu Prasad Shaw and S.G. Vasudev, among others.
Works by Hyderabad’s very own Laxman Aelay and M. Narayan will be on show as would be those of younger artists like Praveena Parepalli and Dev Mehta.
The festival, for which entry is free, will be open from 11 am to 8 pm on all three days.
Meanwhile, Patil observed that visitors in last year’s edition included architects, interior designers, tech workers, art lovers and people who came to enjoy and cherish the visual impact of the creations on display.
