A MOVABLE FEAST

For over five decades — from the gawky moment of his entry to the explosions of Zanjeer and Deewar to a nation on its knees after his near-fatal accident on the sets of Coolie to his plunge into debt and disarray with ABCL to a radical reversal of fortunes with KBC, the arc of Amitabh Bachchan's extraordinary life mirrors something as improbable, as audacious, as potent, as imperilled.

The idea of India itself.

What could do justice to this
moment but art?

As India marks its 75th year as a free republic and the actor turns 80, we undertake a sprawling examination of India through the figure of a true cultural colossus. We invited 51 of India’s most accomplished and eclectic artists — from across artistic traditions as varied as fine art, digital art, and tribal art — to show us the India that Bachchan reveals to them in the mirror of his spectacular life and work.

This specially-commissioned series, that includes some of the country’s artistic luminaries, is not mere homage, but a perceptive act of cultural and social illumination, interrogation, excavation.

Each original artwork tells the story of this country, its pathologies, anxieties, paradoxes, fears, celebrations, failures and triumphs. Each a masterful insight into myth, man, moment.