Citizens of Mumbai have become Japanese or they have come of
age. You may ask why. Japanese tourists, with no intention to hurt their
sentiments, it is said that they see things and people through their cameras
first and enjoy them when they download it into their computers. Physical
location does not matter much to them as they are well capped and often travel
by customized Volvo buses. Whether they are in India or France, they see things
through their viewfinders. The reason may be that their country produces the
maximum number of experimental digital cameras. But gone are the days of
clicking pictures and downloading them in computers. Today, we all click
pictures and whatsApp them or upload them directly into the social networking site
pages. In the age of smart phone cameras and hundred different applications a
work of art remains scandalously reproducible.
(work by Pearl Academy students)
If the visual art section of the Kala Ghoda Festival 2015
could be defined in one sentence, then it would read like this: Twenty odd art
installations multiplied by innumerable digitally stored or transmitted
pictures of it from various angles. As we walk in to the Rampart Row area, beyond
the main parking lot, after crossing earnest looking but ill paid security
guards, a staggering number of mobile phones appear and we have to duck in several
places as if we are caught in a cross fire between two armies who for the heck
of it fight with invisible beams for bullets. I look for art and everywhere I see
people standing in front of curiously shaped objects mostly with glittering
surfaces, taking pictures relentlessly. Nobody seems to be seeing art on the
contrary they are turning works of art into some props so that they could get photographed
against it. Is it a problem? Does this act of people affect the effect of works
of art displayed there? I do not think so. People seem to be enjoying the
spectacle around them quite a bit. When people enjoy the works, either as
aesthetic objects or useful backdrop properties, we should say public art
projects like the ones that we see in Kala Ghoda Festival serve the purpose.
But...
(an installation seen in Kala Ghoda festival 2015)
That ‘but’ is the real problem. Kala Ghoda Festival is in
the mind map of Mumbai citizens. They deem it as their festival. Though there
have been certain disputes about conducting this in the recent times, surmounting
all obstacles it has come back once again, bringing joy to many. But....Okay,
Kala Ghoda Festival is not a hundred per cent fine arts program. Visual arts or
fine arts is a part of it. It is a three sixty degree platform where all finer
aspects of life including literature and cooking are showcased. Theatre, dance
and music are other integral parts of this festival. However, as an art critic,
my focus is on the visual art project. With all due respect to the organizers
and the artists who have worked behind this festival, I should say that none of
them are up to the mark. As artists and art critics, we all have set some
aesthetical parameters so that we could measure up whatever we see around in
terms of art. Kala Ghoda’s Visual art section disappoints and it disappoints
absolutely.
(a public art piece from Kala Ghoda festival 2015)
First of all, the visual art section, which is supposed to
showcase public art projects, unlike in the previous years are too shrill and
they wear slogans in both their sleeves. Each of these works is designed and
displayed there for ‘conveying’ a message. Art, for someone behind the scene,
seems to be a thing of advertisement. It should speak out a message. It should
make people see and ‘read’ the message than thinking about it. The general
expressions that runs around the topics like ‘touch’, ‘frame’, ‘cleanliness’ and
so on, seriously and playfully act out their roles in various familiar and curious
forms. Brinda Miller’s collaborative work with Vikram Bawa and Vikram Arora brings a smile to one’s lips as it is a huge bucket with a tap over it made up of small
little taps and a video of dried out taps playing inside the bucket reminds one
of the major works by another artist we have seen elsewhere. But the problem is
not in similarity or familiarity but the naivity that the artists have approached
the problem of water shortage in Mumbai. It does convey the idea but if you
look at the work of Atul Bhalla who had clicked the pictures of all free water
supply taps, air coolers, manhole covers and so on, we come to know how much
sloganeering this work has. The comparison occurs when someone artistically
presents an issue without resorting to illustrating the same issue. Then it
becomes advertisement.
(From Kala Ghoda Festival 2015)
Advertisement is the catchword. Most of the works seem to
have an advertising edge to it. It could be a widely circulated newspaper in
the city or a popular television channel, it could be a widely recognized and
respected nature and world magazine or some educational institutions in Mumbai
and elsewhere, in everything you could see an element of advertisement. May be
this is how Kala Ghoda Festival gains its funding. But when it comes to art, I
do not think such a pitch on advertising is really needed. There are feeble attempts
at art. For example, a Fiat car, which has been a staple ingredient in the
daily life of Mumbai for a long time, is given a dream makeover. Doesn’t it
look like a description of a Bollywood movie song property? Then you have a
pushcart with wings. Hmm..that is slightly pushed and pulled aesthetics, but
unfortunately it does not work. Then there is a camel made out of gunny bags.
That has a mela interest, but no aesthetical appeal. The national anthem installation
looks more like a Doordarshan set than a work of art. There at the parking area
too in the midst of innumerable stalls that sell trinkets, shawls, kurtis and
sarees, there is an ambassador car jarringly painted over by images from Indian popular culture.
(Ek Hota Kau by Sumeet Patil)
There are two works that I would cast my vote for. One is ‘Ek
Hota Kau’ (once there was a crow) by Sumeet Patil. This set of installation with
the avian images impresses though it looks a bit like a piece in a natural
history museum. This sculptural assemblage could tell you the story of a
survivor bird. It survives playing the roles between scavenging and messaging
between the hither world and the nether world. While all the other species of
birds slowly go hiding or fading as urbanisation grows steadily, this bird
shows its survival instinct by being there all the time, just like a
Mumbaikar. This bird is like a man in the streets of Mumbai. He could survive by
the sheer force of will. This crow is like the legendary Jimmy Cliff’s ‘Harder
they Come’. The other work of art that impresses me is a sliced up Ambassador
car by Hetal Shukla. I prefer to avoid the convoluted title ‘Amby-Sad-Err’- the
title simply does not make sense. However I am impressed by the presentation of
it. It is cut into two halves, just as Damien Hirst had cut a pregnant cow into
two, and are kept in two vitrines. Though the formaldehyde is missing from
the tubs, the halves have their spongy hide intact on them. It could be a
quirky take on Hirst using one of the socio-cultural-economic and transport
memories of the Indian collective mind. But I wish it could have been exhibited
better without the cool spray graffiti over it, which has almost killed the effect
of the work. But it is much better than the 9X Jalwa Amby at the other end or
the spruced up fiat next to it.
(installation at Kala Ghoda 2015 by Hetal Shukla)
It is high time that the organizers of Kala Ghoda Festival
think about the visual art part. The works of art displayed there could be
really spectacular but they need not necessarily be advertising types. Works of
art, even if they are public installations, have some kind of subtlety. It is
not public art. It is a public spectacle with very limited sense of aesthetics.
All that glitters is not gold. All what is shown in Kala Ghoda is not art. Next
time, I wish the organizers would use much discernment in selecting the
projects.
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