Cities: Built, Broken is a solo exhibition by Sudhir Patwardhan that explores the evolving urban landscape of Mumbai and beyond through more than four decades of artistic practice. Originally trained as a radiologist, Patwardhan has long examined the anatomy of both human bodies and urban environments, bringing a diagnostic precision and empathetic gaze to his depictions of cities in flux.
The exhibition reflects Patwardhan’s ongoing engagement with the health and habitability of urban life, capturing moments where construction, destruction, and transformation intersect. Spanning paintings, drawings, and prints, Cities: Built, Broken chronicles the rapid pace of development in Mumbai during and after the 2020 pandemic, juxtaposing local infrastructural upheaval with global images of urban fragility. Through his work, the city emerges as a living, breathing entity — fractured, contested, and full of latent potential. This exhibition invites audiences to reflect on the social, cultural, and emotional dimensions of urban life and the opportunities for wholeness and healing that emerge from its fissures.
Sudhir Patwardhan, born in Pune, Maharashtra, in 1949, is an artist and former radiologist whose practice has spanned more than four decades. Graduating in medicine from the Armed Forces Medical College, Pune, in 1972, Patwardhan practised as a radiologist in Thane from 1975 to 2005. Alongside his medical career, he cultivated a distinctive artistic vision, observing urban life with the same diagnostic precision that guided his medical practice.
The social fabric of Mumbai and Thane, particularly the lives of sub-altern and rising middle-class communities, has long been a source of inspiration for Patwardhan. His paintings and drawings examine the city as a living organism, documenting moments of construction, decay, and transformation, while revealing the emotional and social textures of its inhabitants.
Patwardhan’s work has been exhibited widely, including at the Barbican Centre, London, in The Imaginary Institution of India (2024), and at the inaugural Bengal Biennale in Fragments of Belonging. Major solo exhibitions include Walking Through Soul City at the National Gallery of Modern Art, Mumbai (2019–2020), Hamsafar at Bharat Bhavan, Bhopal (2018), and shows at Vadehra Art Gallery, Jehangir Art Gallery, Gallerie 88, and Sakshi Gallery.
His work is part of prominent collections worldwide, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, New Delhi; NGMA, New Delhi and Mumbai; Lalit Kala Akademi; and the Peabody Essex Museum, USA. Patwardhan lives and works in Thane, near Mumbai, continuing to chart the evolving urban landscape through his empathetic and incisive artistic lens.
Pasting & Posting the City
A collage-making and creative writing workshop exploring the city’s aesthetic evolution to shape modern-day messages
The City in the Archive
A presentation and conversation on Kolkata’s visual history with Dr. Tapati Guha-Thakurta and Dr. Sukanya Mitra
Picturing Life
A cinematic screening that brings Sudhir Patwardhan’s paintings to life, followed by a conversation with artist Sudhir Patwardhan and filmmaker Harshil Bhanushali, moderated by Ashish Avikunthak