one of the contemporary artists for all universes
4
suresh babu maddilety
Hyderabad, India
Biography
Suresh Babu Maddilety (b. 1971) is a multidisciplinary artist working with video art, paintings, and installations. He graduated from JNTU and earned an MFA from HCU in 1998, both in Hyderabad.
Maddilety constructs a conceptual framework that blends philosophy, science, and art, infused with visionary fiction, to challenge conventional views on the impermanence of time, matter, and existence. His work highlights a constantly evolving, cyclical reality of creation and destruction, provoking dialogue about reality’s continuous transformation. Through these foundations, his oeuvre reflects the forms of nature and culture, exploring the connections between everything around him. His pieces are evolving dialogues, not finished works, inspiring viewers to rethink how realities are shaped into lasting forms and embrace creativity.
His work has been shown nationally and internationally, with notable finalists positions in Ars Electronica (2021), Art Slant Prize (2018), and Arte Laguna Prize (2015). He is currently based in Hyderabad, India.
Artist Statement
I combine science and philosophy into visual manifestations using digital media, text, photography, painting, found images and trivial objects.
I am fascinated by how things change over time in a cyclical nature, such as how things transform in the cycles of seasons or from seed to tree and vice versa. I use art to explore these ideas and I think of my art like a puzzle. I am always searching for connections between different ideas and materials. I believe that everything is interconnected and constantly changing
My practice is rooted in the perpetual cycle of matter’s evolution, embracing the eternal rhythms of creation and dissolution. Indian philosophy Samkhya posits a dualistic reality, while Sir Roger Penrose’s Conformal Cyclic Cosmology (CCC) proposes an endless sequence of cosmic epochs, where each universe emerges from the remnants of the previous one, challenging the linear Big Bang model. My works align with the universe’s infinite cycle of beginnings and endings, and I see them as an ongoing project, continuously evolving within artistic discourse and practice.
My mind aligns with nature’s interplay of chaos and order, channelling it into my physical work. Combining social commodities like chemical molecules to form new compounds. My art reflects how even the smallest things, like atoms, are part of a bigger picture. Using various techniques, such as digital collage, new media, and traditional painting, I playfully transform the fundamental elements of matter and the cosmos—atoms and galaxies—into recognizable figures, objects, and landscapes. I explore how mediums naturally evolve over time. Viewing all materials as interconnected atoms, I shape my art as a seed of perpetual transformation.
Ultimately, I view my work as a series of ongoing experiments rather than finished products, aiming to spark curiosity and inspire others to explore.
Artwork Descriptions
1. Social Liquids
2. Universe Constructivism
3. Microscopicism
4. Pronouncism
5. Found the Space for Art
6. Man-made objective art
1. Social Liquids
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artist: Suresh Babu Maddilety, title: social liquid 01, medium: video, year: 2014.
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artist: Suresh Babu Maddilety, title: socail liquid 2, medium: video, year:2022.
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artist: Suresh Babu Maddilety, title: social liquid 3, medium: video, year: 2015.
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artist: Suresh Babu Maddilety, title: icmfspbpce, medium: video, year:2022.
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artist: Suresh Babu Maddilety, title: mjphcopcftcb, medium;video, year:2017.
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artist: Suresh Babu Maddilety, title: 6edsncfetgfsmpmh, medium: video, year:2019.
“Socia Liquids” is an ongoing video art series comprising 11 works created between 2015 and 2024, each around 10 minutes long and available on YouTube. Maddilety explores the concept of combining diverse substances—ranging from municipal water to dog faeces —to create new materials, capturing his spontaneous interactions with these elements in each video. Inspired by material transformations, Maddilety dissects cultural meanings associated with social commodities, viewing substance blending as an art form. He invites viewers to reflect on the fluidity of existence and limitless potential for creation.
2. Universe Constructivism
“Universe Constructivism” (2023) by Suresh Babu Maddilety is a digital media artwork series that transforms NASA galaxy photos into new visual narratives using New Media techniques and Photoshop. The series features pieces like “Universe Constructivism 01,” depicting a house, and “Universe Constructivism 02,” showcasing a mountain and lake landscape, all crafted from galaxy images.
Inspired by the Land Art movement, Maddilety arranges galaxies as his building blocks, creating intricate, cosmic compositions. His work envisions a Galaxy Art movement where artists use galaxies instead of land, pushing creative boundaries into the cosmos. These artworks evoke cosmic grandeur, inviting viewers to marvel at the universe’s splendor and contemplate future scientific and artistic possibilities. Maddilety’s meticulous process, involving mining and arranging galaxy images, reflects the laborious nature of shaping landscapes in Land Art, showcasing his dedication and the intricate details of his creations.
3. Microscopicism
“Microscopicism” is a research-based conceptual project. The starting point was the question of how to conceive a traditional still-life study within the microscopic world of an actual atom, challenging stereotypical connections between reality and tangibility.
“Microscopicism” explores the unseen material world around us. Scientists deal with these mediums to understand how our universe, ecosystems, and bodies function. Maddilety approaches the same topic, but his departure point is the visual representation of microscopic objects, allowing us to view and manipulate these elements for art with the naked eye. While scientists must be pragmatic and maintain a rigid systematic procedure, he allows himself to employ a more creative and insightful process to examine similar hypotheses.
Microscopicism is a way to describe the minutest qualities in the universe in a manner that makes processes, like photosynthesis and cell cycles, visible to the naked eye. He hopes that in the future artists will be able to visualize these phenomena for everyone to see in plain view.
4. Pronouncism
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title: Pronouncism 01- 01 medium: video year; 2023
“Pronouncism” is a video artwork that combines audio, video, and text elements. In the video, we hear an AI software’s voice pronouncing made-up words typed by the artist. Using the Telugu alphabet, native to Andhra Pradesh in South India and Maddilety’s mother tongue, the artist randomly typed letters, allowing the software to vocalise them. The resulting words are absurd.
“Pronouncism” opens up a discussion on our unique routes of thought and how we use our languages, challenging the significance of pronunciation and questioning the meaning we assign to specific sounds and words. Inspired by text art, Suresh explores the concept of using linguistic elements, asking why we use words from language in text art but not the pronouns from abstract words.
5. Found the Space for Art
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artist: Suresh Babu Maddilety, title: art in the moon, Medium: video, Year: 2024.
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artist: Suresh babu maddilety, title: art in the sun, medium:video, year:2024
“Art in the Moon” and “Art in the sun” are a video art created using Windows 3D software, part of the series “Found the Space for Art.” This series explores the concept of creating art within found objects, such as rocks, mountains, the Sun, the Galaxy or even the human body. In this video, the Moon and sun serves as the backdrop. Maddilety embed art within physical matter, and unexpected places like mountains, celestial objects as a form of artists’ experimentation. The drawing itself is not significant; rather, it is the exploration and potential of these new spaces that matter.
Inspired by the idea of an empty canvas, Madilety visualizes new spaces for artistic experimentation, questioning and challenging traditional surfaces and visual representation processes. He questions the conventional use of surfaces like canvas, likening his approach to graffiti artists who seek unexpected locations. However, Madilety goes further by proposing experimental and innovative techniques to embed his art within found objects. His work takes viewers on a journey through his interest in the future, philosophy and science.
6. Man-made objective art
wine bottle
size: 24x24 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2023.___________ In the Man-made Objective Art universe, the wine bottle acts like an atom—its wine drops falling like atomic particles. These wine drops spark the growth of a grape tree without connection, in contrast to our world where trees grow from seeds. Each wine drop serves as an independent catalyst for transformation, which is why the wine bottle is depicted in isolation.
from cement
size: 24x24 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2022_____________In this concept, cement is reversed as the origin of the tree. The tree behaves like cement, solid and structured, defying natural processes. This reimagining reflects the idea that trees, traditionally born from soil, can instead emerge from an unnatural, solid foundation. The tree's behavior mirrors the rigidity of cement, blending the organic and the constructed in a continuous cycle of transformation.
chair
size: 24x24 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2024_______________ In this conceptual universe, the color of the tree originates from the chair, with the trees' coloration behaving like the chair itself. However, since this transformation takes place without direct connection, the trees are not visible. This is why the chair is depicted in isolation, representing the source of the trees' color.
from pollution
size: 20x20inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2023___________In this concept, pollution is reversed as the origin of the flower. Just as a flower grows from the earth, the flower emerges from the byproducts of pollution. This idea transforms the concept of environmental decay into one of rebirth and creation. By reversing natural processes, pollution becomes the seed from which new life, symbolized by the flower, originates.
from makeup
size:25x25inches-medium:acrylic colors yaer:2023____________In the "Man-made Objective Art" concept, makeup is reversed as the origin of the woman. Just as a seed gives birth to a tree, makeup acts as the starting point, from which the woman emerges. This concept mirrors the idea of a unicellular organism giving rise to a complex form of life. By reversing natural processes, makeup becomes the fundamental element.
from the cable
size:20x20 inches medium: acrylic colors year: 2024___________In this concept, the cable is reversed as the origin of birds, even the sky itself. From the cable, birds emerge, shaping the sky around them. The birds' forms and expressions echo the structure of the cable, blending the artificial with the natural. By reversing natural processes, the cable becomes the source from which life and its surroundings take flight.
bullock cart
size: 24x24 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2023_________In this conceptual reversal, the cow originates from the cart. The cow adopts cart-like qualities, and even its surroundings echo the character of the cart.
flower vase
size: 28x24 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2024_________From the flower vase, plants originate. From the tap, water emerges. From the boat, trees, mountains, and even the sun take form. The surrounding environment behaves like a fusion of various man-made objects. This is a reverse interplay, where creation follows an inverted process.
new suns
size: 24x24 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2024____________From a matchstick, suns originate—along with plants and trees. The surroundings take on the essence of a matchstick, though they remain unseen, existing only in the imagination. Here, multiple suns emerge, reversing the natural order and reshaping perception.
from the camara
size:24x24inches-medium: acrylic-colors year:2024__________________In this concept, the camera is reversed as the origin of the landscape. From the lens, mountains, trees, and ponds emerge, creating a vivid natural scene. Just as a camera captures the world, it is reimagined as the source of nature itself. By reversing natural processes, the camera becomes the starting point from which landscapes are formed.
replace with new mountains
size:25x25 medima: acrylic-colors-year:2025_____________If something breaks, we replace it with something new. Similarly, I removed the old mountains and replaced them with new ones, even creating a new atmosphere by removing the old one.
table
size:22x22 medium:acrylic colors year:2024____________In this concept, the table is reversed as the origin of tree trunks, even the earth itself. From the surface of the table, tree trunks rise and the earth is formed, symbolizing a reimagined natural order. Just as a table is a man-made object, it becomes the foundation for the growth of nature. By reversing natural processes, the table becomes the seed from which the natural world emerges.
to be assembled
siz: 25x25inches medium: acrylic colors year:2025___________In our world, making a table involves separately creating and assembling its parts. In the "Man-made objective art" universe, the table is the fundamental unit, and trees grow metaphorically from it, without the natural order of stems, branches, and leaves. Here, creating a real tree means assembling parts in a nonlinear fashion, like constructing a table.
umbarilla
size"25x25inches-medim: acrylic colors year:2024________________In the "Man-made objective art" universe, the umbrella fundamental unit generates clouds and rain, unlike in our world, where atmospheric changes drive these phenomena. Here, the umbrella acts like atoms, forming clouds and rain without direct interaction, which is why it’s depicted in isolation.
walls
size:20x20inches medium:acrylic colors year:2023___________Everything originates from compound walls—trees, flowers, earth, air, and even the atmosphere. The atmosphere itself takes on the form and essence of compound walls, blurring the line between the natural and the constructed.
electric-poles
size:25x25 medium:acrylic colors year:2025______________In this concept, electric poles are reversed as the origin of the entire environment. From the poles emerge land, mountains, water, plants, trees, flowers, air, and even the sky, forming the whole atmosphere. The environment itself behaves like electric poles, though it remains unseen, existing only in the imagination. By reversing natural processes, the poles become the source from which all elements of life and nature originate, reshaping perception and creation.
the sun is landing
size: 24x24 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2023____________The sun serves as a metaphor for an airplane. Here, the sun originates from an airplane and takes on its behavior—moving, flying, and landing. Even the surroundings adopt the qualities of an airplane, with the air itself moving like an aircraft. However, these transformations remain unseen, existing only in the realm of imagination, evoking a metaphysical experience.
bus
medium:Acrylic on Canvas size:25x25inc year:2025____________From the bus’s windows, the sky and trees originate, extending even to the surroundings. The isolated bus also gives birth to humans from its seats, yet this occurs without direct connection—beyond the painting itself. Here, the painting is not confined within the frame; it expands into universal space, evoking a metaphysical experience.
objective rain
size: 25x25 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2025___________Rain originates from an umbrella, which exists beyond the painting in its original horizontal position. The rain itself also falls horizontally. The surroundings take on the qualities of an umbrella, yet this transformation is a metaphysical experience, extending beyond the visible.
wine bottle and glass
medium:Acrylic on Canvas size:20x19inc year:2025___________In this concept, the wine bottle and glass function like atoms, while the wine itself represents the electron. Unlike in traditional atomic structures where electrons orbit the proton, here the roles are reversed—the proton moves around the electrons. This inversion highlights a unique set of physical laws, reimagining fundamental interactions in a new reality.
ponds
medium:Acrylic on Canvas size: 20x19inc year:2024______________In this concept, the boat generates ponds, but the ponds resemble the materials of the boat itself. The surroundings adopt the qualities of a boat, yet this transformation exists beyond the visible realm. It is a metaphysical experience, where form and function reverse, challenging perceptions of origin and materiality.
no one created village
medium: Acrylic on Canvas size: 20x19inc year: 2025_____________In the "Man-made Objective Art" universe, the village takes the place of atoms as the fundamental unit. Unlike our world, where atoms form everything and even exist independently, this village was not created but emerged on its own.
boat river
size: 20x20 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2023_____________In this concept, the boat generates the river, yet the river takes on the form of the boat. The boat exists both within and beyond the painting, extending into an imagined space. This reversal of origin transforms the river into a metaphysical extension of the boat itself.
from brick
size: 24x24 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2022_____________A brick generates a tree, with its trunk shaped like a brick wall. The surroundings absorb the essence of the brick, yet this transformation remains unseen, existing as a metaphysical experience beyond the painting.
creating sky
size: 22x22 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2022_______________A ladder generates the sky and space, but there is no land or stars, as it embodies the abstract behavior of the ladder. This unique space, unlike our natural world, is a metaphysical experience.
creating canvas world
size: 24x24 inches-medium: acrylic colors year: 2021____________The canvas painting generates land, sky, water, and atmosphere, shaping reality rather than depicting it. Surroundings take on the essence of the painted forms, extending into a metaphysical experience where creation and perception merge.
“Man-made objective art” is a series of 30 colourful and bright paintings on square canvases, created between 2019 and 2024. Inspired by the philosophy of “materialism” where abstract matter is primary, and nature and man-made objects are secondary, Maddilety’s “Man-made objective art” redefines creations.
If we go in-depth about materialism, the primary matter is built by atoms. Maddilety’s concept of “Man-made objective art” redefines creation, envisioning man-made objects as fundamental units akin to atoms. In his art, he reverses natural processes, crafting trees from tables and vines from wine drops. He believes these paintings are like drafts, and in the future, they will be brought to life through quantum technology or nature will bring them to life on its own.
CV
SURESH BABU MADDILETY
Born 1971, Medukurthi, Andhra Pradesh, India.
Lives and works in Hyderabad.
https://artsted.com/profile/portfolio
EDUCATION:
Graduation: 1986-1992; B.F.A J.N.T.U. College of fine arts, Hyderabad.
Post-Graduation: 1996-1998; M.F.A University of Hyderabad.
FINALIST:
NEULAND Gallery video screening in Bochum, 2024-Germany.
U.S. Consulate General Hyderabad on India-US Space Cooperation contest 2024
Special prize winner, Mellow Art Award 2021
For video work in IAR International Artist Residency 2020- Napoli (Italy).
For installation work in YICCA Art contest 2017/2018 – Milan (Italy).
1st 2018 Art Slant Prize juried winner, USA.
For installation work in YICCA Art contest 2017- Rome (Italy).
For installation work in Art Laguna Prize 2015- Venice (Italy).
For installation work in Premio Combat Prize2015- Livorno (Italy).
SELECTED FOR ART FESTIVALS:
Goes:Art, On Screen festival 2024, Vienna, Austria.
The Ars Electronica Festival 2021, Austria.
Festival DeSidera 2021, Italy.
ARTISTS SELECTION FIRST PHASE:
Air Land 3.0 INSIDE LAND organized by the Quasi Quadro association, 2020, Turin (Italy).
AWARDS:
47th All India Art exhibition by the Hyderabad art society, 1988.
ONE MAN SHOW:
On 13th Sep 1998, at C.I.E.F.L, Hyderabad.
GROUP SHOWS:
The Dalí’s Surprisingly Surreal Photo Contest Online Exhibit 2025, The Dalí Museum in St. Petersburg, FL, USA.
MOTILE ART the 4th International Online Art Exhibition 2024, India.
CISTA ARTS online group show Metamorphosis: Exploring Transformation Through Art, online group show 2024, London.
ICAC art gallery group show, 2022, Ahmedabad, India.
Round Lemon international online show2021- UK
PITCH collective video mapping, 2021- Russia
Finalists Exhibition -YICCA Art contest 2017/18- Milan (Italy).
Finalists Exhibition – YICCA Art contest 2017/- Rome (Italy).
Finalists Exhibition – Art Laguna Prize 2015 -Venice (Italy).
Finalists Exhibition – Premio Combat Prize 2015- Livorno (Italy).
International Gallery Of The Arts (IGOA). online exhibition 2017.
ARTIST IN RESIDENCY:
Artist Residency Programme By Kerala Lalit Kala Academy, 2017, India.
PUBLICATION:
Abirpothi, India’s only daily art newspaper, 09/10/2024, 2024.
Artists of the Month, October 2021, Wendy.network.
Artist profiles, May 1918, ArtSlant.
Wotisart Magazine,12th August 2017.
ART Habens, 1916.
EXHIBITION PARTICIPATION:
J.N.T.U. College of Fine Arts Annual Exhibitions;
1988,1989,1990,1991.
All India Art Exhibitions, The Hyderabad Art Society;1988,1989,1990,1991,1992,1993,1994.
P.S. Telugu University Exhibition of Art, Hyderabad; 1997.
ARTIST CAMPS: Andhra Pradesh Young Artists Camp by A.P. Govt., 1997,1998,1999,2000