Prasanta Sahu is an acclaimed painter who hails from Odisha. Curiously enough he first studied electrical engineering before deciding to pursue an art program at Kala Bhavan, Santiniketan, from where he took a BFA. He followed this up with taking an MFA in painting and a gold medal from the famed MS University of Baroda.  

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The divisive nature of human thinking and the actions that stem from it is the broad subject of Prasanta’s art. His paintings reflect these concerns and take on the form of commentaries on society. They attempt to throw light on the frictions that underlie many conflicts in present day urban Indian society, highlighting, in particular, its veiled hypocrisies that have the potential to manifest as grave brutalities. He skillfully combines pictures and text borrowing freely from motifs in mass media to create arresting emotional textures and moods. His canvasses carry monochromatic images that are thrown into sharp contrast with vividly painted ones to form alluring textural spaces. Ultimately, the paintings transform themselves into performative gestures trying to bridge and unify the twin worlds of art and society.

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Prasanta Sahu lives and works in Santiniketan, Kolkata. He travels extensively and has participated in numerous national and international shows both as an individual exhibiting artist and as part of a group honoring a particular theme or choice of materials. 

His exhibits have graced many famous galleries in Asia,

America and Europe. There is great variety in his works that combine drawing painting, print, sculpture, video and installations in varying degrees and measures to make a social statement or aesthetic emphasis. Sometimes they turn into collaborative ventures as in the case of the celebrated Project Tihar where he worked closely with the inmates of Tihar jail.