New whine, old art

Roping in traditional artists to paint current themes would be better if they were left to their own devices, suggests Kishore Singh.

That Sachin Tendulkar should be cast as Ram, or Krishna, isn’t without precedent, though it has usually been actresses who have been the muse for calendar artists when casting around for goddesses to paint.

And that miniature artists should paint contemporary themes has not been without precedent either, though, again, these have been commissioned works, as in the case of Eicher’s New Delhi guide; more spontaneous works have been by pat artists from Kolkata, whose depictions of the tsunami, for instance, have been unheralded.

 

But here, now, is a work on public life in India, warts and all, as it tackles, according to the curator of Desh Ki Awaaz, Amit Jain, “commercialisation, corruption, pollution, poverty”.

It is a somewhat cynical and less than endearing premise, driven perhaps more by despair than anger, and it sits uneasily, for this is art not as an outpouring but as it is imposed, demanded by the People Tree Arts Trust in much the same way that a corporate body might demand it, storyboard and plan outlined, with the traditional artists only having to fill in the gaps and colours.

Within this sensibility, their own world is lost. Somewhere, in this space of empires and multinationals and a nouveau, perhaps even a “shining” India, aspirations are shown up as greedy consumerism, palaces make way for palace hotels, Hindus get converted to Christianity by missionaries, “Beverly” and “Malibu” townships or villas show up the discords of existence.

These are important issues, not necessarily farcical, even though frivolous treatment may be considered an essential form of detachment if artists are to view them through the prism of “popular art”. If so, the exhibition might have succeeded better at a venue akin to Dilli Haat: the gallery space at Triveni Kala Sangam, where it has been posted by Apparao Galleries, is itself exclusivist, which would defeat its very purpose.

Since the artist has been rendered secondary to the process of these narrative works, 40 of which are on display, though a total of 200 will figure in the book by architect, but increasingly urban, social commentator, Gautam Bhatia, on the theme, the rendering of these graphic stories is too disjointed to hold interest.

And since the artist has not been allowed his own narrative energy, they are too reminiscent of each other, too repetitive, and too difficult to view as an exhibition. A funded project, three years in the making and now on exhibit in Delhi, the show travels next to Chennai, and then to Bangalore, while Jain says they’re looking at more funds to help to take it out of the country.

“I have been looking at the works for at least a year,” says Jain, “and related to them –— the idea was not to hurt anyone’s feelings through them.” To the extent that a McDonald’s appears over traditional, heritage architecture, or a cola bottle rises higher than the temples of Khajuraho, the humour is cutting, unsparing and universal. It is when the narrative becomes the dominant form, superceding the art, that it becomes somewhat agonising.

The works have a folksy lilt, and though they might be “unrefined, untouched”, Jain says the art (and craft) has been left that way — spelling mistakes and all — to appear the more natural. The interpretative art is strong, but if it is to make itself seen, the “collaboration” needs to take that into account: you cannot negate the public from public life any more than you can take away the artist from the art.