Grand Show At New Delhi’s Sridharani Gallery

Devajyoti Ray, one of the most original visual artists of post-liberalization Indian art will be holding yey another solo show at New Delhi. The show will be organised by Sreedharani Gallery at their own premises in the month of October. But the question is how far is it justifiable to hold a show in these troubled times when the art market is facing acute recession?
On the one hand it is very bold move on the part of Devajyoti Ray as most other artists of India like Bose Krishnamachari, Justin Ponmany, Subodh Gupta are not holding shows these days. “Ray has an advantage over the other artists”, said Sudhanshu Paliwal of Galerie Art Eterne. “Ray is the only artist among the new generation of masters whose prices have not fallen and that is because Ray’s works are available in a very limited numbers with only a handful of galleries”.

Agreed. But the show is not being organised on the sheer optimism of possibility of commercial success. In fact inside news is that almost one third of the paintings to be exhibited will be pre-sold, ie these works will be those which were made by Ray over the past one year on order.
Sridharani Gallery is the oldest of New Delhi’s prestigious galleries. Part of its premises were rented to Rameshwar Broota, one of New Delhi’s best names of yesteryear. The ground floor was given to Ebrahim Alkazi, one of the finest art presenters of modern India. Yet a gallery of such reputation has in recent past not done well partly because of the recession, and partly because of the unhealthy practices that had engulfed the Indian Art market. Launch parties in almost all art shows had seen the free flow of liquor. The highly corrupt press in India was often paid to cover undeserving art shows. Sridharani Gallery had always avoided all these things. So big art houses avoided the gallery.
But now the gallery is being renovated and many of its previous rules will also be revamped. To get back to its feet, the gallery now requires some big names and some good shows. Devajyoti Ray’s show is likely to get the gallery that leverage that it had been craving for.

Art Books in times of recession

Vadhera Art Gallery, one of India’s top ranking galleries has opened an exclusive Book store for art related books. For the time being, Vadhera book store is having a total of 1200 title to chose from. This will include the include Vadhera’s own sponsored publications like “Made for Maharajas: Design Diary of Princely India”, “In Conversation with Husain: Paintings”, “In Adoration with Krishna”, “Jogen Choudhury: Enigmatic Visions” as also western publications on masters like Goya, Picasso, Monet and Francis Bacon.
Art literature in India is in a very nascent stage and most of what is published are sponsored by galleries to boost their own sales. Often an artist who has a book written on him or her is considered a good artist in not only India but probably entire Indian subcontinent. Noting this, many galleries have in the past three years have published books on their own artists. Such books hardly cover any true assessment of the artists and the reader gets nothing better than false eulogies written by paid writers.

We have thus seen a book on Paresh Maiti last year that claimed to have chronicled Maiti’s travel to Kerala. The book hardly tells much about the artist and for a serious reader of art such books can provide no real information. The book was launched before an exhibition and was thus meant to have very limited purpose of boosting sales of Maiti’s works. Such books are hardly any better than catalogues of exhibitions; only these have more pages and are hence more expensive.

Following the big galleries, many others had followed suit. Among the many artists on whom books were published included Manish Pushkale, Harshvardhan, Riyas Komu, Chintan Upadhyay, Bose Krishnamachari and many others. All these artists are new faces in Indian art and the time for such books were probably way too immatured. But the show continued. One estimate says that more than a thousand books on these artists had come up last year alone.

Vadhera Book Store is now bringing these books in a store. This is not likely to hel the real readers of art. What is more interesting is that the store keeps books of only those artists who are in Vadhera’s camp. Thus the store is likely to end up into a propaganda paltform rather than a true book store. The managers of Vadhera are aware of this and hence they do not expect much sale of these books either. To keep business running the store is thus selling posters, postcards, even handbags, and phone covers with prints of important paintings.

This assumes relevance as faced with recession, many galleries are now converting part of their galleries into book-stores, boutiques, etc. Hyderabad based Kalakriti Gallery had a book store for a long time. This is also true for some of the Bombay based galleries. But none of these galleries are into serious book selling business. The art-book business is thus more of a veneer for propaganda for in-house artists. Serious readers are not likely to benefit.

Literature of Epic Ambitions

There is no dearth of ambitions among the writers of the sub-continent. But ever since Salman Rushdie had won the Booker Prize for his “midnight’s Children”, authors in the subcontinent have stopped writing simple and beautiful stories so as to devote time for writing books of epic dimensions. Greed for big money and glamour of big prizes is making writers in the sub-continent search for big international events and then somehow joining them with a story line.

In Rushdie’s Midnight Children, the main protagonist is born at the midnight of 15th August, 1947 when India and pakistan wins their freedom. Then the protagonist charts his family history and finds that his grandfather was a Kashmiri. In the process of telling about his grandfather, Rushdie tells about the the generation of Kashmir problem. The same man then travels to Punjab and witnesses the Jalianwala Bagh massacre, then lands in Pakistan and then in Bangladesh to track the history of Bangladesh Liberation war and the state of India when PM Indira Gandhi had imposed emergency in India.

Events of epic dimension, landmarks in history and important personalities like Nehru, Jinnah, Gandhi, etc are thus sewn together for the western readers who can identify the Indian subcontinent only on the basis of these. The cock and bull stories thus created seldom match reality. Rushdie was never known to be a writer who is much read by the people whom he claims to represent. His language is also dull and his books are often very tedious to read. But so what? Readers of west is all that matters to people like Rushdie.

Now Rushdie is inspiring a generation of writers in the subcontinent and the Indian and Pakistani diaspora to write such stuff. No need to scratch one’s head on style. No need to find a coherent heart warming story either. And certainly there is no need to be real. The recepi for a good novel are as follows:

a) Pick up some imporatnt historical events

b) Pick up some important personalities from histroy who are still talked about

c) Join whatever you have picked. To do so make your protagonist travel to all these lands and meet such people who are somehow associated with these events and personalities.

The latest writer to have tried this marvellous technique is Pakistani author Kamila Shamsie.

In her latest book Burnt Shadows, Kamila’s protagonist is a Japanese lady who survives Nagasaki Bombing. Before the Bombing, she was married to a German soldier who had died fighting in the second world war. The German soldier’s sister lives in India. So the protagonist can now travel to to India and here she gets close to a Muslim man who suffers pangs of Partition and migrates to Pakistan. She follows this man to Pakistan later where the Muslim man’s son becomes a Islamist terrorist planning to attack USA. Finally the protagonist moves to USA where her sister-in-law who once lived in India, has also shifted. The sister-in-law’s  son has now joined the CIA so that the reader can now get the view of CIA also. The story finally ends with the 9-11 destruction of twin towers.

Epic in scope though, the question is ” Is it literature?” Badly written, unconvincing in its approach and sweep of events, such books are however the toasts of the west. The problem is that it is discouraging serious writers from attempting anything serious in the sub-continent. This may be good for some individual writers like Kamila Shamsie, for the overall development of literature in the sub-continent, this is something we have to guard against.

Will Asian Art survive the recession?

Recession has hit everyone from the biggest bankers to the smallest share holders, from the corporate honchos to the retail shopkeepers. But while many of the sectors of economy are struggling to suurvive somewhow, one sector, it seems is already showing signs of battle fatigue. It is art.

The last ten years had seen an unprecedented growth of the fine arts sector.  The indian republic, which is the largest and the most populous country of the region accounts for almost forty percent of the region’s global trade. Indian films dominate the film market in the entire area and has a sizeable presence in the middle east. In 1991, the government of India had opened up its economy to international trade and since then the Indian market got exposure to international brands.

Painting by Devajyoti Ray

Along with the global business houses, India also witnessed the entry of international art auction houses like Bonhams, Borubudur Auctioneer, and then Christie’s and Sotheby’s. Indian art and artists got international exposure and many soon became the toast of the western art world.

Subodh Gupta, one of India’s young generation artists fetched record price for a contemporary art-work ever at an auction organised by thwe Christie’s. Bose Krishnamachari, another artist took Indian art to a new high as he organised a series of participations for artists from Indian subcontinent in various Internatioanl fairs. This helped artists like Rashid Rana of Pakistan, Iqbal Ahmed of Bangladesh among others to ttain international standings. Many of the artists’ art works were aquired by important international art houses, museums and galleries. All these artists are young and below forty.

Such unprecedented growth was possible due to largley the expatriat subcontinental community now living in Europe and America; a community that is not only quite large but latelya has also become quite influential in the socio-political affairs of Europe and America.

But now with recession, suddenly the sales of the art works have fallen drastically. The expatriat community is losing jobs in Europe and USA, the international auction houses have decided to not sell Indian art works for the next one year. And all the hulabaloo that was happening in the art world looks like a bubble in rear-view mirror.  Many of the galleries in India and Pakistan are closing down, many of the artists have cancelled their shows. Clearly the art world looks scared.

Yet all is not bad, says some. While the boom in art market had attracted almost anybody with money to open a gallery in the hope of cashing  in  on the situation, the recession is likely to throw most such non-serious players out of market. Many flashy artists with very little talent supported bya corrupt press touted themselves as the next big thing. Such artists are also likely to exit the arena. So it s a cleansing process that was required, argues some, inorder to make art prevail over gimmicks.

As can be seen from a recently held show at Karachi, some of the best artists of Pakistan like Ijaz ul Hasan are still holding grounds. Devajyoti Ray one of India’s best known artists in recent time is holding shows successfully in Dubai, and Europe. His works are very much in demand in Middle East. Also many of the auction houses like Bonhams continues to buy works of subcontinental artists though at bargained prices. Borubudur recently bought a whole lot of works of Indian artists, which would be presented at a future date for auctions when the art market revives.

Marketing the Negatives: New Intellectualism of Subcontinent

The Indian Subcontinent is a land of socio-religious plurality with each community having a band of fanatics and fundamentalists. The government whether democratically elected or forced upon by coups cannot ignore these varied interest groups and their views, however skewed they may be. This is the reason why Satanic Verses written by Salman Rushdie, which was alleged to have objectionable commentary on Prophet Mohammad, was banned out rightly in all the countries in the region except Sri Lannka and Nepal.
In India however the Hindu Rightwing parties had demanded a lifting of this ban saying that it was against the freedom of expression (freedom of expression is a fundamental right in India). Nonetheless the same parties demanded the ban of James Laine’s book Shivaji : Hindu King in Muslim India, which was alleged to have portrayed the Hindu warrior king Shivaji in bad light. This book too was out rightly banned in the Indian state of Maharastra.
Up till recently it is only the religious fundamentalists who had been supporting such bans while the liberal-secular intelligentsia in all these countries opposed them. But of late a new development is being witnessed. People who had been considered liberal for a long time have come out openly against certain books and art works.
In West Bengal (the part of Bengal that remained with India after partition of India) liberal writers like Sunil Gangopadhyay, Shakti Chatterjee and other liberal vanguards of Bengali culture have criticized the books written by Taslima Nasreen who hails from neighboring Bangladesh.
Nasreen was earlier exterminated from Bangladesh for her controversial book Lajja but she became the toast of the west and she was given asylum in Europe. India too had opened the doors for her. West Bengal, the centre for modern art, literature and liberal ideas had always supported her. Why then is this sudden criticism from the liberal quarters.
According to Gangopadhyay, while Nasreen’s religious ideas or her criticisms of any culture are acceptable, her book is at the end written in very bad taste. Her books which are full of sexual encounters read often like pornography and the intellectual class believes that Nasreen is in the habit of writing such deliberately candid books only to raise controversies so as to sell well.
During the past few years the western market has become quite open to books, art works, films, etc from the sub-continent. While this interest is quite welcome, the problem is that the west has stereotyped impressions about the region and it buys such works which fits into this stereotype. Many believe that books like Kiran Desai’s “The Inheritance of Loss” or Arvind Adiga’s “The White Tiger” have won Booker Prizes in recent years only because they spoke about the seedy side of India; their literary values have been questioned in many forums. The west wants, it seems only something that speaks of the negative side of the region, even if what is said is more pseudo-real than real.  Even in recent sales of art works of Indian origin, many artists have complained that western buyers only go for subjects which talk about the underbelly of India.
Devajyoti Ray, one of India’s successful painters of the young generation had mentioned recently that his work on themes like Baul (name for a Bengali gypsy singer) and mother (which depicts a poor slum mother) sold mostly with the buyers from Germany, France and USA while his series on modern Indian urban women had few takers in the west. Another Indian artist of some repute, Bose Krishnamachari had complained that most of the art works that he had taken to Madrid ARCO Fair returned without sale partly because the works showed little of traditional art and more of emerging India.

The Great Censorship Culture

Stories of censorship either by the state or self styled protectors of national culture run abound in the Indian Subcontinent. They continue to haunt the liberal minded citizens of this region.

A recent exhibition in Dubai of art works of Colin David brought back the memory of one such dark phase in Pakistan. Colin David, a British by race, but a Pakistani by birth was born in 1937 in Karachi. He had his art education at the Punjab University, Lahore, when the Fine Arts Department opened its doors to male students in 1956. After taking his MFA from the Punjab University Fine Arts Department in 1961, Colin was awarded a scholarship for post-graduate studies at the Slade School of Art, London.

Colin could have stayed back in London and build up a successful career in art there but had chosen to return to his birth place and joined the faculty of the Fine Arts Department of the Punjab University. He remained there until 1964, and then joined the National College of Arts.

Colin David's Nude Study

Colin’s signature works included elements of Op art fused with portraits and landscapes in classical genre. His paintings often had a nude woman in the centre. Nudity is not necessarily linked to eroticism and Colin’s works could not be classified as erotic art. For sometime Colin did have a smooth sail as his works became popular with the art –students. But the dictatorial regime of Gen Zia ul Haq put Colin in a corner. The new military regime brought in draconian censorship laws, where women could not be shown without traditional clothes and dupatta. National policies decreed that figure studies were no longer artistically acceptable.

Yet Colin decided to stay back and exhibit his works mostly in his own studio for selected viewers. His paintings could not be sold openly and so he had to export them abroad where European collectors bought his works.

Though he had stopped selling his works in Pakistan, Colin continued to exhibit his work discreetly until 1990, when an invitation to a private viewing of work at Colin David’s house fell into the wrong hands. Shamefully, the event became a black spot in Pakistan’s art history, as a gang of young men, leaving one of their numbers armed with a gun on the doorstep of the house, burst into the artist’s home brandishing sticks. They proceeded to destroy a number of canvases, including a portrait of the artist’s young daughter.

Today none of he important works of Colin David exist in Pakistan and an entire generation of Pakistani youngsters lost the opportunity of viewing one of Pakistan’s most prolific artists.

The attack on MF Husain in India’s biggest cosmopolitan city by a band of religious fanatics brings us back to that era in Pakistan when Colin David was attacked. It seems things do not quite change in the sub-continent.