Shridhar Bapat | |
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Born | 1948 (age 75–76) |
Education | London School of Economics (LSE) |
Movement | Experimental Video Art |
Shridhar Bapat (born 1948) was an Indian video artist and key figure in the New York City's downtown video art scene in the 1970s. [1] [2] Bapat's artworks were screened at the MoMA PS1 [3], Whitney Museum of American Art, [4] The Kitchen, and the Mudd Club. [2] He a was an early organizer of video programs at The Kitchen [5] and the Avant-Garde Festivals of New York. [2] He took over as the Director of The Kitchen, an influential experimental artist center in Manhattan, in 1973. [6] [7]
Shridhar Bapat was born in India in 1948. Since his parents were high-ranking Indian diplomats, his family moved to Japan, and then to the United States. Bapat spent most of his childhood in suburban Westchester, New York. [1]
Bapat attended university in Geneva and London, but was expelled from the London School of Economics (LSE) after the 1968 student uprisings. [2] It was in New York City where he started his career as an artist. Bapat learned the basics of video at a class taught by Global Village, one of the first video collectives in the city. [1]
Shridhar Bapat's artwork largely involves video and feedback. Bapat's installations would have cameras pointed towards each other, [1] and the viewers would see themselves in self-reflexive self-monitoring loops. He once boasted about being “the best feedback camera turner” in New York. [1]
His piece, Aleph Null (1971) and other video works were exhibited in MoMA PS1, [3] The Kitchen, [2] and the Whitney Museum of Art. [4]
He was described by his peers, including Shirley Clarke, Nam June Paik, Steina and Woody Vasulka, as a brilliant artist. [1] [2] His early video pieces mainly exist as unseen copies in Northwestern University's Special Collections. [1] Bapat's video feedback fantasia Aleph Null (12 min, 1971) was exhibited in MOMA PS1, 2013. [3]
He was well known as a program director and curator. In addition to working at Anthology Film Archives, he became director of The Kitchen [7] and was the first video curator in its earliest period. [3] He co-directed the Women's Video Festival with Susan Milano [8] [9] and the Kitchen Video Festival.
He was also the assistant to many artists such as Shirley Clarke or Nam June Paik. [1] After leaving The Kitchen, he joined Shirley Clark's Video Space Troupe. [10] [1]