Megha Joshi
PROJECT
Megha Joshi’s sculptures and installations are known for their inclusion of Hindu ritualistic objects. In this new site-specific work, Joshi expands her use of agarbatti, or incense sticks. Found in many Indian homes, these items are produced, usually by women, in various settings, both formal (in factories, using machines) and informal (at home, by hand). This work uses incense sticks without their coating and therefore scent, provoking questions about whether an incense stick without its smell is still embedded with meaning. The installation also frames and partially obscures eighteenth-century history paintings and portraits drawn from the NGV Collection.
The acquisition of this artist’s work is supported by Vivien & Graham Knowles
ABOUT
Megha Joshi is a contemporary Indian artist who trained as a sculptor at the Faculty of Fine Arts, MS University Baroda, India. Joshi worked as a set designer and art director for film and television for ten years before she returned to her fine-art practice in 2008. She has held solo exhibitions at New Delhi galleries including Studio Art and I:Object, and has participated in a number of group exhibitions, most recently as part of the India Art, Architecture and Design Biennale, New Delhi; the Visual Arts Gallery, New Delhi; and as part of the exhibition program at APRE Art House, Mumbai. In addition to her gallery-based practice, Joshi has created large outdoor public art commissions including a work for The Sculpture Park Madhavendra Palace, Jaipur, in 2024 and The Constitution Museum, Sonipat, in 2025.
NGV Collection
Explore the collection pieces that helped shape this artist's work.