The sixth edition of the India Art Fair, in Delhi, turned out to be a mixed bag this year, even though it saw one lakh visitors. Since the art market is regaining the balance that it lost during recession, the Fair reflected an increase in sales. However, the organisers seemed unwilling to take risks, and presented predictable hits like Husains and Razas. There were several run-of-the-mill paintings by artists like T Vaikuntam, a banal painting of water lilies by Sanjay Bhattacharya and a crumpled badly mounted line drawing by Pablo Picasso that only indicated the gallery’s miserliness and unwillingness to bring better works by him to India.
Perhaps it is time for the India Art Fair to abandon the safe and to tread more confidently towards the bold. Art restorer and critic Rupika Chawla says, “It is apparent from the Fair that easel painting is back.” While Chawla is a connoisseur of painting and modern art, some of her contemporaries who like to push the boundaries of art seem to have stayed away, while a few others rose to the occasion.
Neha Kirpal, the founder and director of the Fair explains, “The Art Fair is a key impetus within the commercial art world, it exposes local and international galleries to a large and diverse audience from India and around the world.” While Kirpal highlighted the commercial aspect, she added, “We have a variety of cutting edge solo projects and have focused on sound art this year.”
Shireen Gandhy of Gallery Chemould said sales have improved, “We have sold to our regular buyers, even though the market is still too jumpy for new buyers.” Early this week, Gandhy had reportedly sold three important art works, which covered the average cost of the booth and allowed for some profit.
Pushing the envelope There were about 10 to 15 cutting-edge galleries and art projects out of the 91 booths that participated this year. A phone booth created by Israeli artist Achia Anzi packed a surprise. On stepping inside the inky booth, voices saying, “this number is busy”, surrounded the viewer. This was followed by a gush of air from two fans, one above and one below, which disoriented the viewer. “I imagine the telephone booth as a launching station from which one takes off into the ungraspable space of longing, desire and fantasy,” says Anzi who is represented by Threshold Art Gallery.
Not far from the phone booth was an eight-foot clay spiral-shaped sculpture. Artist Anindita Dutta invited performance artists from National School of Drama, Delhi, to interact with it — they clawed at it, scratched it and hit it. “We are all part of the earth, our struggles and conflicts are impermanent,” says Dutta, explaining her work.
Nobina Gupta’s ‘Kalpataru the Wishing Tree’ comprised a stainless steel tree fit with electronic sensors that responded to movement. When a viewer neared the work, the lights would flicker and a recording of people’s wishes played in the background. The artist encouraged viewers to sit under the tree and listen to the wishes while recording their own.
Works by artist Priyanka Dasgupta pleasantly surprised us. Her interactive multimedia piece, titled ‘Forgetting’ was based on her grandmother. The goatskin sculpture of her grandmother, reminiscent of the leather puppets of Kerala, was placed before a projector that reflected the sculpture’s shadow. A sensor went off as you went near the piece and the shadow would become smaller and appear to recede into the distance. “My grandmother was a recluse and yet she would want us over all the time. It was the push-and-pull of emotions that I wanted to capture in this piece,” said the New York-based Dasgupta.
Abhay Maskara’s booth was full of thought-provoking works like T Venkanna’s confrontational graffiti-like paintings, Shine Shivan’s rather sinister tapestry woven out of the severed heads of dead chickens and provocative video works by artist Ruben Bellinkx, which captured three dogs fighting over a chair.
The usual blockbuster of the show was artist Subodh Gupta whose giant chandelier created out of steel utensils, tube lights and bulbs was a highlight for many. Jagannath Panda’s eight-foot golden deer that hinted at our shrinking natural environment was also a showstopper, as was Jitish Kallat’s doll-like sculptures that commented wryly on the practice of frisking and body searches in today’s ‘age of terror.’
What was perhaps most unpleasant to art lovers was the blatant presence of corporate sponsorship, with large corporate signs that merged with the art. While Kirpal and her team were quite happy to merge the boundaries of art and money some galleries and artists were not too happy about it.
Nirav Modi’s diamonds and Raseel Gujral’s Paradox lifestyle stall were a rather unusual inclusion. “I don’t feel comfortable putting up my stall near something that sells diamonds and throw pillows. Are we saying that art is just another commodity?” said Laura Williams a South Asian Arts specialist. Another gallery owner grumbled, “We are being charged a whopping amount — over ten lakh, while the Paradox stall is not charged anything? How is that fair?”
Maskara said, “The structures of art fairs are currently such that the art market dictates what art is shown where and who is noticed internationally or not. An art fair can only build on that structure and perhaps when there are alternative ways of funding we will see a bit more experimentation.”
As long as the promotion of art lies in the hands of private entities and the government plays shy of sponsoring art, events like the Art Fair will have to rely on corporate sponsorship. But sponsorship should not intrude on the artwork or impede on the viewers’ experience.
Georgina Maddox is a Delhi-based art writer