For too long, Indian Contemporary Art has been confined to galleries, museums, and private collections. But what if the city itself became the canvas? This August, Chennai transforms that question into an experience turning its streets, spaces, and stories into an open-air stage for contemporary art.

From 8–25 August 2026, Contemporary Now · Edition III transforms the city into a vibrant contemporary art destination. Featuring 66 artists, seven leading Indian galleries, and over 10 venues, the city becomes a sprawling art landscape. Exhibitions, artist walkthroughs, conversations, workshops, and open houses extend the experience beyond the traditional gallery model. Instead, it creates a city-wide cultural dialogue that invites audiences to engage with contemporary art from multiple perspectives.

Practices in Continuum reframes contemporary art as an evolving practice shaped by research, experimentation, and sustained inquiry. The curatorial proposition traces contemporary art as an evolving practice rooted in research, experimentation, and artistic inquiry. Practices in Continuum explores contemporary art as a living process shaped by research, experimentation, and continuous inquiry. Contemporary art emerges not as isolated objects, but as evolving practices shaped by research, experimentation, and inquiry. Practices in Continuum traces how contemporary art evolves through research, experimentation, and sustained artistic inquiry.

Rather than presenting individual artworks in isolation, the exhibition encourages visitors to understand the broader ecosystems from which they emerge. Every gallery becomes a lens through which an artist’s practice unfolds. Every artwork becomes part of a larger conversation examining memory, migration, ecology, politics, materiality, identity, language, and lived experience.

In doing so, Contemporary Now challenges one of the biggest misconceptions surrounding Indian Contemporary Art – that it merely reflects the present. Instead, it proposes that contemporary art actively shapes how we understand it.

Lalit Kala Akademi hosts the exhibition, while a vibrant city-wide programme connects Chennai’s cultural institutions, galleries, archives, and studios.The exhibition occupies two floors at Lalit Kala Akademi, while Chennai’s galleries, archives, and studios join the city-wide programme.The exhibition takes over two floors of Lalit Kala Akademi, extending across Chennai through galleries, archives, institutions, and studios.Lalit Kala Akademi anchors the exhibition, while cultural institutions, galleries, archives, and artist studios activate spaces across Chennai. The result is a cultural network that encourages audiences to move seamlessly between exhibitions, conversations, performances, and immersive encounters with artists and curators.

This year’s edition brings together seven of India’s most influential galleries – Ashvita’s, Chemould Prescott Road, Chatterjee & Lal, Experimenter, Project 88, TARQ, and Vadehra Art Gallery. Collectively, they present works by sixty-six artists whose practices represent some of the most significant voices shaping contemporary Indian art today.

Rather than showcasing individual masterpieces, the exhibition celebrates artistic continuity. It acknowledges that meaningful artistic practices evolve over years of experimentation, dialogue, and critical reflection. Visitors are therefore invited to engage not only with finished works but also with the ideas, questions, and processes that continue to shape them. The city’s expanded programming reinforces this philosophy.

Open houses provide rare access to Ashvita’s Archival and Conservation Centre. Sculpture takes centre stage through Continuiverse, featuring works by C. Krishnaswamy. Photography enters the conversation through In Dialogue with Nature, presented by the Chennai Photo Biennale Foundation and WWF-India. Studio exhibitions, modern abstraction, artist walkthroughs, and heritage exhibitions further transform Chennai into an immersive cultural landscape where every venue contributes to a larger narrative. Equally significant are the event’s conversations, which explore the evolving relationship between art, publishing, collecting, patronage, and regional identity.

Discussions such as From Mylapore to Mumbai (and Beyond) investigate how southern India continues to shape contemporary artistic discourse. Conversations on private collections and public impact examine the responsibilities of cultural stewardship, while sessions dedicated to photobooks explore how publishing itself has become a critical artistic practice. Collectively, these conversations position Contemporary Now not simply as an exhibition but as a platform for intellectual exchange.

As Director Priyanjoli Basu observes, Contemporary Now functions as “a learning structure.” It encourages audiences to move from gallery programmes to artistic practices, from artistic practices to individual works, and ultimately to the larger social, political, and environmental realities those works examine. This philosophy becomes especially relevant today.

Contemporary art increasingly asks difficult questions about identity, migration, ecological collapse, technology, memory, belonging, and collective futures. Rather than providing answers, it creates spaces where these conversations can unfold with nuance and complexity.

That spirit is reflected throughout the participating artists, whose practices span painting, sculpture, photography, installation, textiles, performance, and interdisciplinary experimentation. Established names stand alongside emerging voices, creating a richly layered portrait of contemporary Indian creativity. Yet perhaps Contemporary Now’s greatest achievement lies beyond the exhibition itself.

Instead of positioning galleries as isolated destinations, it transforms Chennai into an interconnected cultural ecosystem. Visitors experience art not only inside exhibition halls but throughout the city, inside conservation centres, artist studios, public discussions, archives, workshops, and cultural institutions. The boundaries between exhibition, education, and public engagement begin to dissolve. In doing so, Contemporary Now offers an alternative model for how contemporary art can be experienced in India. It becomes participatory rather than passive. Conversational rather than prescriptive. Continuous rather than momentary.

As the third edition opens its doors, it demonstrates that contemporary art is no longer confined to white walls or gallery spaces. It lives in cities, communities, conversations, and shared experiences. For twenty days, Chennai becomes more than a host city. It becomes a living exhibition.

And perhaps that is Contemporary Now’s most important contribution, not simply presenting contemporary art, but reminding us that contemporary culture itself is something we collectively create and continually redefine.