Born in 1947 in Shimla (Himachal Pradesh), Shakti Maira spent his formative years at St. Stephens College, Delhi, and later at the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA) before journeying into the world of artistry, and academia.
He is a critically acclaimed artist-philosopher whose work has been widely exhibited, and is in the collections of the National Gallery of Modern Art in India and in private collections around the world. He speaks and writes on art, aesthetics and culture in India and abroad, and has contributed essays to three anthologies: Transmissions and Transformations edited by Kapila Vatsyayan, The Cult of the Goddess edited by Arputha Rani Sengupta, and Artistic Visions and the Promise of Beauty, which he co-edited with Kathleen Higgins and Sonia Sikka. In 2005, he helped organize the ‘Learning through the Arts in Asia’ symposium in New Delhi and was invited by UNESCO to formulate the ‘Asian Vision of Arts in Education: Learning through the Arts’. In 2012, he co-organized an international conference, ‘The End of Art and the Promise of Beauty’, held in New Delhi. His first book, Towards Ananda: Rethinking Indian Art and Aesthetics (2006) focused on contemporary art and its place in the emerging global art scene. The Promise of Beauty and Why It Matters is his second book.
