(1949 - 2015)
Born in 1949, in Mumbai, Mrinalini Mukherjee was the daughter of renowned artists Benode Behari and Leela Mukherjee. She studied Painting at the Faculty of Fine Art, M. S. University, Baroda (1965-1970), and then studied mural design under artists like K. G. Subramanyan, receiving a Post-Diploma in the field in 1970. Mukherjee’s recent bronzes, like her earlier sculptures, were inspired by nature and its energies and elements. In 1994, she was invited by the Museum of Modern Art, Oxford, for an exhibition of her sculptures that later travelled in the United Kingdom. More recently, Mukherjee’s work was included in the ‘The Body in Indian Art’, an exhibition curated by Naman Ahuja at Bozar in Brussels in 2013. Previously, in 2012, she was part of a group exhibition ‘Crossings: Time Unfolded (Part II)’ curated by Roobina Karode at Kiran Nadar Museum of Art. These pieces were an extension of Mukerjee’s iconic early work with natural fibres like hemp, and her ceramic goddesses-blossoms series from the 1990s. The artist passed away on February 2, 2015.