Magic and Mythmaking in Roshan Ganu’s “रातराणी: The Night Blooming Jasmine”
February 5, 2025—Roshan Ganu is fascinated by the night. It’s a fascination she wasn’t always able to explore growing up in Goa, India, where caution rules women’s mobility in public spaces. “We grow up hearing ‘don’t go out at night.’ It’s something that’s just so hardwired [into a woman],” says Ganu. Nighttime held a mythic quality as a result, and continued to reach out to her—so much so that it became the driving influence behind her current exhibition, “रातराणी: The Night Blooming Jasmine.”
Selected for the 2025 spring Minnesota Artists Exhibition Program (MAEP), Roshan Ganu brings a dynamic vision to life in Mia’s 2,500-square-foot U.S. Bank Gallery. Creating an immersive nightscape, she explores what is, for many women in India, a subversive question:
“What if I dip my toe in? What’s going to happen? What if I fly? What if I dance around? What if…”
View of the exhibition “रातराणी: The Night Blooming Jasmine” installed in U.S. Bank Gallery (G257) at Minneapolis Institute of Art. Exhibition on view at Mia November 23, 2024 – February 23, 2025.
“As an installation artist, I associate two things with the MAEP opportunity,” says Ganu. “The scale of the space and the large scale [of the] audience. As someone who loves being challenged by space, the gallery’s high ceilings and expansive yet bare architecture were a welcome opportunity for growth.”
Ganu uses the gallery to weave together the myths and magic of her childhood growing up in Goa, India. She recalls how The Night of Narkasur, a tradition commemorating Lord Krishna’s slaying of the demon king Narakasura, was the rare night she would be allowed out. “I found it fascinating that this ‘demon’ was my liberation,” smiles Ganu. “[It was a] legitimate reason to be outside exploring neighborhoods, appreciating this asura (demon) for what he is and how he set me free, however briefly.”
Playing with these themes, the artist fashions a myth of her own, painting a young girl flying across paddy fields and sculpting the same entity suspended in midair. “O refused to stop flying at night,” reads the wall text.
Ganu links together each work—video, ceramics, and paintings—to form a circular narrative. You can enter and start viewing from any location. Slanting, rectangular mirrors are placed throughout the exhibition, allowing viewers to see themselves as part of this nighttime expedition. The darkness is transformed as if by magic—trepidation and fear give way to entrancement and imagination. “Seeing the plenitude of people engaging with the narrative, movement, and dreaming in darkness has strengthened my resolve to create more of such contemplative spaces in the world,” says Ganu. “It brings me joy to witness an intergenerational and intercultural audience finding their place within the installation.”
The gallery has cushions and benches for those who wish to linger. You are invited to stay awhile and delight in the deviance and dreaminess of a lush, evocative night.
About the Artist
Roshan Ganu is a multimedia artist originally from Goa, presently based in Minneapolis. Her practice uses iterations of light, darkness, moving images, and space and time to explore the poignant states of our human condition. She is interested in the interflow of meaning between the linguistic, visual, experiential, and transdisciplinary. ‘Isolation’ is the predominant framework through which she perceives the human condition, the overriding subtext in her work.
Ganu was recently announced as a 2025–2028 Jerome Hill Artist Fellow and received the Jerome Early Career Award in 2022. Her multimedia work has been featured at the MDW Art Fair in Chicago, Franconia Sculpture Park, and Twin Cities Fashion Week. She has received grants and projects from the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, Minnesota Opera, Minneapolis Institute of Art, and Springboard for the Arts. Ganu has taught in classrooms in Goa, India, and Versailles, France, and is currently a Foundation Studies Professor at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design.
Find Roshan online: www.roshanganu.com and @blingalingthoughts
About the Exhibition
“रातराणी: The Night Blooming Jasmine” is on view through February 23, 2025 in the U.S. Bank Gallery.
About MAEP
The Minnesota Artists Exhibition Program (MAEP) is a curatorial program at Mia dedicated to exhibiting and supporting artists living and working in the state. Founded in 1975 as a partnership between the museum and regional artists, the MAEP has become a unique, ongoing relationship lasting 50 years.