The gods of art are here

India's largest art show will open next week on an unprecedented scale, amidst hope and optimism.

This, the ultimate outing for Indian art lovers, is a wet dream of possibilities and realities — the best that India has to offer, on an unprecedented scale, ranging from the pre-moderns to the very cutting-edge of contemporary art, wielding a swathe across geographies to include Afghan and Bangladeshi artists, European and Asian and India-born creators, from gigantic works to small formats, across a dizzying range of mediums, with the buzz but also the mayhem of a disturbed hornet’s nest. In the days leading up to the second edition of the Indian Art Summit, from August 19-22 at New Delhi’s Pragati Maidan, the ancillary industry has seen the kind of action it had become unused to — designers are being hired to style the galleries, framers are doing double shifts to complete assignments, customs officials are being harangued to clear artworks, catalogues are being prepared, printers are matching images with offset reproductions, price lists are being readied (with hope, cross those fingers!), even cranes hired…

 

…for what else can be used to shift the 890-kilo, gigantic Navjot sculpture that will be placed in the Sculpture Park by Delhi Art Gallery? Where, no doubt, it will keep company with another huge sculpture of a Dalmatian by who else but that irreverent humorist and sculptor Ved Gupta (courtesy Gallery Threshold). This is the first time India has seen such excitement with regard to sculpture, and who can blame us: Haven’t we, finally, got Britain’s Anish Kapoor (Lisson) to take a bow and send us his work, a nod to the country of his birth. Of course, you’ll find sculpture — plenty of it — in the stalls too, but in the Park, expect surprises, for this is the first time a range of artists and galleries are coming together to assemble and dissemble without barriers, so subjects can vary from the ludicrous to the intense — such as “ambitious sculptures by Shanti Swaroopini”, promises Threshold’s Tunty Chauhan, or Vibha Galotra’s “lovely installation of five buildings of fabric, wire, paper,” says Galerie Espace’s Renu Modi, “you go up and down, up and down…”.

Within the exhibition galleries, the pace of competition is infectious. Delhi Art Gallery’s Ashish Anand, who has the largest space at the summit, is still hoping that the representations he is making will allow him to display his prize M F Husains — a request denied by the management because of a fear of vandalism — but Husain lovers can take heart in artist Ravi Gossain’s works that will be shown in the city’s Gallery Ragini, at Lado Sarai. Several such simultaneous exhibitions are being organised, so it might seem that the whole city, and not just a part of Pragati Maidan, is an art venue — but more about that later.

For now, let us see what the Summit itself offers. Artworks worth an estimated Rs 400 crore (and estimates that at least a quarter of that might sell over the four-day event, with other orders in progress once it ceases and moves back to the galleries) will include the pick of Indian and at least a taste of international art. Vadehra Art Gallery, with two stalls, will merely extend its presence from its three city galleries into the summit — one of which will showcase its prize works, the other its books and collectibles for those looking for souvenirs as takeaways. Contrast that with the comic book illustration art of Seven Art’s Chitra Ganesh, or Apparao’s Alexis Kersey and you begin to get a sense of what is in store ahead for you.

Because expectations from the summit are riding high, galleries are pulling out all stops. Gallery Espace is showing “from 71-year-old but still contemporary Zarina Hashmi to Jagdish, who does paper sculpture, and has a sound sculpture of a bicycle with even its spokes made of paper”. The minimal works of Rushika Patel are being introduced, Abul Kalam’s “strong imagery of goddesses” on large digital prints will be talking points, and Chintan Upadhyay is there with “different materials”, promises Modi. That she’s also a part of the ambitious Video Lounge with her Video Wednesday stars, as well as of curator Gayatri Sinha’s The Purple Wall Project, showing the best of modern and contemporary art at different locations throughout the summit, should be something to look forward to.

In fact, it is these multiple locations, multiple choices that seem to be a highlight of this summit. Visitors can dawdle at any of the lounges and parks without the pressure of being put through a sales pitch by the galleries. If galleries such as 1 x 1 are showing just one solo artist — Chittravanu Mazumdar — others like Vadehra or Delhi Art Gallery might well be a one-stop shop of Indian art. The latter has 18 artists and 85-odd works at the summit, the largest of which will be a collection of F N Souzas including his nudes, his landscapes, still lifes and drawings, followed by a huge section of Chittaprosad and Hiren Das prints, Jamini Roys, Gogi Saroj Pal, G R Santhosh, Rabin Mondal, Himmat Shah Amitava Das and, as a teaser, 75 digitally printed photographs from its recently acquired collection of Nemai Ghosh’s photographs of, particularly, Satyajit Ray.

The Devi Art Foundation has an interesting project it will reveal at the summit — its Dream Museum Project, in collaboration with the Asia Art Archive in Hong Kong. Visitors to its booth will be provided postcards on which to write their ideas of what a dream museum should be “in an effort to generate knowledge about museums as well as bring them to the fore in public consciousness,” says Anupam Poddar. “It also helps to re-think notions of museums as static institutions, as is commonly assumed by Indian publics.” As part of its involvement with the summit, the Devi Art Foundation, in Gurgaon, will hold an exhibition to “obliquely deal with the notion of borders” with a solo show of Bangladeshi artist Mahbubur Rahman’s “The One Year Drawing Project” by four of Sri Lanka’s most critically acclaimed artists, and a special showing of “Souvenir Maker” by Indian artist L N Tallur.

Of course, Devi is also a part of the Video Lounge, with curated videos from Afghanistan and Pakistan, as is Religare, which is a corporate but nevertheless elegant presence in the trade, with its show-stopping arts.i gallery. Religare’s debut at the summit will “not be too cluttered, though we have a large space” says its Mukesh Panika, who says its platform will be provided for emerging artists across media. But what it is also doing that is interesting is scheduling informal but engaging talks on each day of the summit on works from its foundation, at its booth. These include Ranjit Hoskote talking on Atul Dodiya, collector Rajashree Pathy on Prithpal Singh Ladi’s sculptures, and Alka Pande on V Ramesh.

If the excitement is palpable, it’s easy to understand why. Spread across 4,500 sq m, with 54 participating galleries, 17 of them from overseas, the summit will bring together collector, dealer, investor and expert on the same platform as the art lover. Nor will visual stimuli be the only sensory overload. Planned as part of the summit, but with an accompanying Rs 7,000 stricture as fee, is a forum of speakers who will focus on issues ranging from the rise of Asia as an art market to the effects of globalisation on art, from emerging markets to the role of the gallery, from creating value to five decades of collecting in India to valuation, from matters of diapora art to the journey back to aesthetics, and, of course, artists and critics in dialogue — the last one, in particular, to watch out for. Speakers at these seminars range from art consultants to experts, gallerists, collectors, exhibitors, curators, professionals and amateurs, and come from, besides India, around the world — Europe, Asia and America.

Marigold Fine Art, which has established its presence with foreign art in India, has specially imported works of Lorenzo Quinn and Dganit Blechner for the summit, where they will join the likes of Salvador Dali, Pablo Picasso and Andy Warhol limited editions and works by Stephane Cipre, Jorg Doring and David Kravoc. Art Alive has decided to use as its theme “Think Small”, a collection of 12”x9” works by artists from its gallery, and is also showing Prabir Purkayastha’s photographs (“Return to Eden”) at its gallery. Anant Art is going across mediums to show paintings, sculptures and videos from a mélange of artists including Sheila Makhijani, Atul Bhalla and Probir Gupta. Gallerie Nvya’s showing is also multi-disciplinary and is titled “Jewels of Art”, and most works have been specially created for the summit.

Across the city, a series of collateral events have been woven in — some of those mentioned earlier, others including an exhibition curated by Johny ML at Lalit Kala Akademi, Alka Pande’s photography exhibition on “The Wonder that is India” at Instituto Cervantes, Vishal Dar’s interactive art project on the façade of British Council, Khoj and Mondriaan Foundation’s sound composition of horn patterns of auto-rickshaws in Central Park, and special exhibitions at Art Alive, Anant, Vadehra, Devi, Seven Art, Talwar and other galleries, and even a high tea at the National Gallery of Modern Art.

For many of us, the presence of Nature Morte and Bodhi and Sakshi, of Thomas Erben and HBgalerie and Aicon, of Photoink and The Loft and Chatterjee & Lal, of galleries and artists from Dusseldorf and Berlin, Latvia and London, the Philippines and New York, from across Mumbai and Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore and New Delhi, in the same space, at the same time, as a collective, is almost too wide to fathom. Participants too are looking forward to exploring newer dimensions, hearing the gods of art talk, and see the best Indian works with as-yet unknown artists from abroad. While Sharan Apparao is looking forward to “the spirit, the possible curators and new collaborations we can forge”, Arun

Vadehra will be watching the audience keenly “for greater spectator interest, especially from the uninitiated”. There should be enough and more of that.