IDENTITY IN SERIOUS CRISIS : Soumitra Das

It is the same in art. Increasingly, and disturbingly, it is becoming impossible to pinpoint the country of origin of a work of art, even if it is argued that it is not necessarily the function of art to imitate nature — not produce a carbon copy, that is. One wonders how far removed some contemporary works of art are from ground realities and perceptions. It is mind-boggling even to try to imagine how Aristotle would have rewritten his Poetics had he been confronted with the art of our times. But imitating international trends is the surest way to success, and many Indian artists are savvy enough to recognize this. One’s identity has become a casualty of the market, and artists do not hesitate to assume an identity not necessarily their own. The other trick is to sell certain aspects of one’s ethnicity such as motifs and symbols that have gained iconic status and are easily recognizable in the West. And this trend is not confined to the visual arts alone. Fashion designers, artists and writers have discovered this ploy much to their delight and profit. India’s is a famously syncretic culture. But now the past is being systematically obliterated. Aakriti Art Gallery’s current exhibition, No Content Worries (upto October 18), conceived by Vikram Bachhawat, explores this “identity crisis” of contemporary Indian artists through the works of 14 young practitioners hand-picked from all over the country. As his note in the catalogue stresses, “It is no more an attempt to devise a content based on a context delimited within a regional periphery.” Mansoor Ali Makrani’s Human Instincts (etched glass with text and lights) embodies the potentially factious polarities in the life of an ordinary human being as he embarks on a quest for identity. The artist’s quandary is perhaps aggravated by his faith, and Identity Issues (archival print), in which a booklet of Quran verses, a toy-like Ganesh, and a ceramic hand are thrown in together, addresses that problem. Nobina Gupta focuses on the increasingly alarming problem of environmental degradation, ironically, through a video installation of spectacular lyricism titled Nascent Forthcomings and an archival print of formal beauty titled Eternal Quest (picture) created with pen and ink. Gupta’s is an apocalyptic vision of upheavals, destruction and calamities in the natural world, which, however, holds the promise of birth and regeneration. Her concept may not be new, but she has successfully married the haunting background score with engaging video footage. The junk Nantu Behari Das uses to create two sculptural pieces itself gains as much importance as the work itself. Jacque the Fruit, composed entirely of fibreglass and nails, turns into a metaphor of transformation of a common man’s fruit that appeals to our tactile sensibility. The artist cleverly uses traditional skills to create a work in which the actual and the symbolic are interchangeable. Most of the paintings, however, are run-of-the-mill and do not match the superior quality of the sculptural pieces and video art. Priyanka Lahiri and Sagar Bhowmik are talented painters and are dab hands at photo realism. But their skill does not extend beyond that dimension. They lack the vision to contribute to this discourse, so to speak, on the changing nature of Indian contemporary art. Vivek Sharma tries to conjure up a vision of tranquillity in a world that is moving away from nature. It is a commentary on the rapidly commercialized world of ours but lacks the sharpness that such an analytical exercise requires. This happens to be the weakest link in an exhibition otherwise satisfactorily mounted. Since the gallerist has gone to the expense of bringing out a catalogue, he should have taken a little more care about its editorial content. http://www.telegraphindia.com/1100904/jsp/opinion/story_12891710.jsp