What makes for a successfully curated show? For over a year now, I’ve struggled to answer my own question. In the last fortnight, I seemed to have finally gleaned some worthwhile insights.
Two specific shows, both in Delhi, produced a kind of Eureka moment. One was Retrieval Systems, curated by Ranjit Hoskote for Art Alive Gallery. The other, Lost in an Urban Maze, on the urban condition, was uncurated but instructive, hosted by Palate Art Gallery.
Hoskote has the brilliant ability to peel off layers from an art work by simply placing it in context, both in his writing and his curation. Retrieval Systems, therefore, was promising in multiple ways. First, that it was conceptually exciting. Hoskote explored how artists delve into personal memory to create work. This is not new, but the curator’s selection of diverse artists under the same roof offered a different perspective. And second (there was, of course) the sheer thrill of the works themselves. Of all the artists in this show, Manjunath Kamath most successfully worked within the concept. His semi-complete cupboard and digital prints were from his own childhood memories, quite typical of what was then the emerging Indian middle class. In one of his prints, a dark character sits haunched. It’s a familiar, humiliating, corporeal punishment meted out as late as the 1980s. Anyone 30 and above, growing up in India, can recall that quite easily. These small works are framed in thick, white, oval frames. Manjunath distinctly remembers these ovals as popular when he was growing up. Some other works didn’t fit into the larger concept, throwing me off track repeatedly.
All through this show, I was struck by how challenging it is for the curator to bind-and bond-the artists in his curatorial concept. It was certainly hard to trace a common thread, even non-narrative, throughout the show.
Bigger shows have been known to lose their curatorial thread because it is simply too hard to “curate” works by, say, a hundred artists. Even if each of them is selected for their specific work and the issues they address, a large show is likely to become an art-extravaganza. Surprisingly, so was the much smaller Art Alive show. This points to the issue of how artists work with curators. No matter how diligent, how meticulous or how brilliant the curator, the artist clearly must share in an intense, common process with the curator before even making works for a show. In the age of (still) relatively high pressure on several artists to produce works, this becomes very hard. Between global group shows, solo shows and commissioned work, unfortunately, there is very little time to reflect. Rarely, if ever, can an artist afford to spend time mulling over the curator’s words and conceptualise their own practice as a response. Put very simply, a successfully curated show must serve as a dialogue, not a collection of artists marking their attendance in the curator's fitting room. Despite market pressures, it can’t be impossible. Last year, the Gayatri Sinha curated Mutant Beauty for Anant Art Gallery quite successfully accomplished this. If anything, her work underscored that it is entirely possible for a medium sized show to remain well bounded by a cogent narrative.
The second show at Palette Art Gallery didn’t list a curator, but the owners — Rohit Gandhi and Rahul Khanna — clearly worked out a concept and planned the show around it. If urban was the theme, it was clear from the works. Yet, the show itself pushed the discussion of what curating can mean and how it could have been used to challenge both viewers and artists. It was, interesting but could have been more demanding on each artist. After all, a curator should be able to push the artist to rethink their own work, explore it more deeply, beyond theme and narrative. The curator must serve as an equivalent to a gym trainer in a mutually agreed-upon transaction. Their work is not only to tell a larger story, but enable artists to constantly reinterpret it.
