Indian Artists during the Right Wing Regime and the forthcoming Venice Biennale

(Artists with Adwaita Gadanayak, Director General of the NGMA)

Are the Indian artists making the kind of art that is expected of them at this peculiar socio-cultural and political scenario in the country? The amount of time that the artists spend in the social media in order to vocalize their angst against the growing right wing extremism and its covert and overt encroachments in the field of art, culture and daily life of people in general is comparatively longer than they used to spend there in the yester years. There are three types of artistic voices expressed in the social media: one, direct and acerbic criticism of the right wing government and its henchmen. Two, controlled and metaphorical statements including expressing solidarity with the collectives responding to the right wing forces, which is often seen as something oscillating between social responsibility and critique from the safe zones. Three, sharing carefully researched articles against fascism, stories of atrocities against the Dalits and minorities and when they are in their humorous best and devoid of snobbish guards, the trolls that rip off the genetic ladders of the right wingers.

Let me go by the Bacon style here. First group is reckless while second is cautious and the third always survive. Like their recklessness the members in the first groups form a minority community that still revel in cheap cigarettes, tea and street side hangouts. The second group is a nebulous category led by a few recognizable voices. The third group is conspicuous because of its fence sitting attitude. If someone comes in search of them they could easily say that they were just ‘sharing’ the trolls for its sheer sense of humor. Let me clarify a bit here. The first is a jobless group. They don’t have anything to lose other than their revolutionary verve. The second group is committed to the cause of revolution and social justice but definitely they do not want to risk their lives. The third category is already sold out to the corporations and to their collateral agencies. The feebleness of their critique should be understood from where the food comes to their dining tables. This set of people either pretends that the corporations are really benevolent or they have not understood anything that they have read in terms of postmodern theories so far.

(Kiran Nadar, the founder director of KNMA)

With the right wing governance consolidating in India during the last five years and with a lingering hope of the extremists regarding their coming back to power even with a cut to size majority, in the art scene certain filtering and fermenting has happened and the precipitation has been quite amusing. If you look at the programs planned at the NGMAs and the group of artists regularly go around to express their allegiance to the right wing cause you would understand that all these years these gentlemen and ladies have been waiting in wings to make their entry however insignificant their roles are in the grand scheme of the tragedy. I do not want to personally criticize anybody involved in the NGMAs for at least deep in their hearts they believe they are doing the right thing. Right from the head of the NGMA to the readjusted existing staff members from the former regime and to the newly appointed director board members believe that they want to do something really ‘better’ to improve the quality of the NGMAs’ administration and enhance the quality of the exhibitions produced.

The tragedy lies in this belief. While the right wing ideology is misogynistic, anti-progressive, anti-Dalit, anti-left and anti-all-what-can-be-outside-the-pale-of-cultural-nationalism the very hope that one day these newly appointed well-wishers of culture could bring about some change itself is on a shaky platform or in other terms on a sticky wicket. Like all the totalitarian regimes do, the voices of all the director board members are heard and noted, but the final decision will be taken by the cultural heads of the right wing. Hence, if at all anybody has any illusions about doing something really revolutionary in the NGMAs the maximum that can happen is getting themselves shot or hacked at some point or unceremoniously offloaded on the way. In the best case scenario they could be signing the minutes register for all what is going to happen in terms of art exhibitions, take their TA, DA and good hospitality in three star hotels and go home with a pricking conscience if at all any ether substance of that name left in them.

(Nandlal Bose)

Two things became clearer and in perspective: one, we could see who all have been genuinely right wingers in the art scene and for long been suffocating. Two, we could also see the fence sitters and careless opportunists who went rushing to the director boards in various capacities. Take the example of the forthcoming Venice Biennale and the Indian Pavilion put together by none other than the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art (KNMA). Two things became clear with the involvement of the KNMA. One, the right wingers do not have artists who could be shown to the light of the day. Two, when it comes to the corporations what leads them is not ideology but money. The India Pavilion in the Venice Biennale is led by the NGMA. It has only one thing to offer: the Haripura Panels painted by Nandlal Bose in 1938. Master Moshai, as Bose was called reverently, did this series at the insistence of Mahatma Gandhi. The right wing had shot at Gandhiji and with the right wing regime ruling India and has been vigorously distorting Indian history has absorbed Gandhiji into their pantheon. Hence, Nandlal Bose stands a chance; not Binode Behari Mukherjee who had painted the Medieval Saints.

(from a former Venice Biennale)

Now look at the other artists that the KNMA has selected for the India Pavilion. I do not want to pick them out and criticize. But out of these willing collaborators two of them were a part of the Kochi Muziris Biennale, which is heavily supported by the KNMA. That means, it is KNMA representing India in the Venice Biennale, not the NGMA or the parent organization, the Cultural Ministry. I have been told that the support of the KNMA comes as the NGMA does not have that kind of money for the logistic support. It can be true because during the UPA regime, with Rajeev Lochan as the NGMA head and Ranjit Hoskote as the curator of the Indian Pavilion in the Venice Biennale, there had been last minute glitches in Venice and the curator was temporarily bailed out by the KMB team that was touring in that part of the world for the first edition of the KMB. When the right wing regime colludes with a private cultural tycoon, it is not just an innocent act of strategic collaboration. It is a large scale cultural buy out that predominantly happen in most of the other industries. Though they may look strange bed mates, the business interests that the culture cartel leads make the conjugal a smooth affair. With no modes of resistance in hands what the participating artists could do is nothing but just behaving politely and smiling profusely on the opening day. And yes, the third category will ‘share’ all what these artists put out there in the social media, be it photographs, curatorial notes and some European press clippings.