Bina Sarkar Ellias
Bina Sarkar Ellias is editor, designer and publisher of International Gallerie, a global arts and ideas journal (www.gallerie.net) founded by her in 1997. She is also a poet and art curator. https://mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com/opinion/city-columns/bina-sarkar-the-cave-woman/articleshow/59865389.cms
Cultural Practitioner
In 1984, Bina Sarkar Ellias co-founded the advertising agency "Nucleus", with Rafeeq Ellias and worked for 12 years as its Creative Director. In 1997, she founded International Gallerie, a bi-annual arts and ideas magazine that she edits, designs and publishes.
In recognition of her efforts, she has been awarded a Woman Achiever's award by FICCI/FLO 2013, Woman Achiever of the year by TimesGroup & ITC, in 2008 and a Fellowship from the Asia Leadership Fellow Program and Japan Foundation for research and development of the project: Unity in Diversity: Envisioning Community Building in Asia and Beyond, Tokyo, in 2007 in recognition of her work in encouraging knowledge, understanding and appreciation of cultural diversity. She has also been recipient of the Prince Claus Awards.
Sarkar Ellias has been invited to speak at various venues, chaired the New Moves Festival discussion with 10 Asian women artists in Glasgow as well as other fora in London, San Francisco, New York, Tokyo, Teheran, Dacca, Lahore, Karachi, Delhi, Santiniketan, Kolkata and Mumbai in the last many years.
Editor, writer, poet, curator
Ellias began early in life as a freelance writer to Desmond Doig's Junior Statesman, and was employed as assistant editor to T.M. Ramachandran of Film World, an eclectic Indian magazine on world cinema, soon after her graduation with English literature from the renowned Scottish Church College, of the University of Calcutta. She went on to be a sub editor at Eve's Weekly, following which she contributed articles for The Times of India, The Indian Express, The Hindu and the Hindustan Times through the years.
She taught herself graphic design and has been invited by artists, galleries, photographers and a poet to design their books and catalogues. To date, she has designed and edited, Fifty Years of Contemporary Indian Art, 1997, for the Mohile Parikh Centre for Visual Arts, Mumbai, 1997 . She has designed artist Jehangir Sabavala's catalogue for the 2002 show in Mumbai , Delhi and New York, artist Rekha Rodwittiya's catalogue, 2003 and recently in 2007, for shows in New York, Crossing Generations: diverge, the fortieth anniversary catalogue for Gallery Chemould, Mumbai, 2004, and a book on artist Tyeb Mehta, Svaraj by Ramchandra Gandhi. She has designed, edited and published an art book, Chinthala Jagdish:Unmasked, 2004, and The Curious World of Chinthala Jagdish, 2008, a book of poems, Rain, for Indian poet Sudeep Sen, 2005, Ayesha Taleyarkhan’s book of photographs:, Bombay Mumbai, 2005, American photographer, Waswo X. Waswo’s book, India Poems: The Photographs and his recent catalogue, A Studio in Rajasthan, 2008. She has edited and designed photographer, Leena Kejriwal’s book, Calcutta: Repossessing the City, 2006. And artist Surendran Nair’s book, Itinerant Mythologies, 2008.
Sarkar Ellias has curated several art shows: ‘Rain’ at Sakshi Art Gallery, Bombay, commissioning 32 Indian contemporary artists to make works on Rain; ‘Kashmir’ at Tao Art Gallery, Bombay, where artists from Jammu & Kashmir, long-marginilised, were invited to present their works with mainstream Indian artists in an awareness program of Kashmir, its history and conflict; and ‘The Curious World of Chinthala Jagdish, a show of the Hyderabad artist and his whimsical art works. She curated the online show of international art for Pen & Brush, New York, and launched her curatorial project 'Tagore Lost and Found' with 30 Indian artists at Siddhartha Tagore's Art Bull Gallery in New Delhi, 1 March 2013. She recently curated 'Migration' for the Pune Biennale 2017. It included photography, films and poetry mounted in six shipping containers with junk art created by Pune artists in the foreground.
A poet, her chapbook of poems, 'The Room' has been published by AarkArts, UK, besides having appeared in various magazines, anthologies and online poetry sites. Her book of poems 'Fuse' has been published by Poetry Primero, an imprint of Poetrywall, 2017. Poems from it have been translated into Arabic, Urdu, French and Chinese. A Chinese edition of FUSE was launched at the Formosa Poetry Festival in Tamsui, Taiwan, 2017. FUSE has also been taught at the Towson University in Maryland, USA.
International Gallerie
International Gallerie was conceived and founded by Bina Sarkar Ellias in 1997, as a platform for addressing universal socio-political/cultural issues as interpreted through the arts, and ideas.
Quotes
“Gallerie draws my attention to what I didn't know or what I thought I never needed to know... it is positive and passionate.” -Mel Gooding
Personal life
Bina Sarkar was married in Tokyo to photographer and award-winning documentary filmmaker Rafeeq Ellias[1] and they have two children; Raoul Ellias, an IT professional in the US and Yuki Ellias, a theatre actor who played Hermea in Tim Supple's "Midsummer Night's Dream", and has received a "Best Actress Award" from her solo performance in "Elephant in the Room", which played at the Fringe Festival, Edinburgh, 2017, for three weeks.. Bina Sarkar Ellias lives and works in Bombay.