The Eye in the Sky
- Artist: Gauri Gill
- Artist: Rajesh Vangad
- Date: 2016
- Medium: Ink on black and white inkjet print photograph on paper
- Dimensions: image: 1076 × 1573 mm
- Museum: Tate Modern
- Collection record: Tate Modern website
Listen to the free audio guide
About this artwork
This is the “The Eye in the Sky” by Gauri Gill and Rajesh Vangad. The piece is a large black‑and‑white photograph taken by Gill in Maharashtra, centered on a sacred mountain of the Warli community. Vangad overlays the image with traditional Warli pictograms, drawing in thick black ink to turn the landscape into a symbolic map. Warli art has no written script; stories are shared through these simple, repeating shapes. In this collaboration the photograph becomes a canvas for Vangad’s hand, while the ink adds a narrative layer that Gill’s lens alone cannot capture.
The work speaks to the tension between rural tradition and the pull of modernity. Birds and other flying creatures give way to planes, hinting at Mumbai’s looming skyscrapers and the migration of villagers into the city. The mountain itself turns into the pupil of a looming eye, suggesting surveillance and the erosion of natural resources. Together, the medium and the symbols invite the viewer to zoom in and read details, then step back to see the whole story of displacement and myth woven into the landscape.
See it in person
The Eye in the Sky is in the collection of Tate Modern on Bankside, London — free to enter. Point your phone at any artwork there and audioguide.london plays a free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
