Art is so many things. Elephant dung arranged systematically in a way in which the artist wants to communicate is art as also painstakingly drawn fine lines that bring a scene to the viewer. When art transcends visual language, lines, race, colour, medium and more, and breaks the shackles of what the world till then thought was art, you have the biennale.
Everything about the biennale is new. The biennale brings to the frog in the pond that is you, art as is envisaged by the powers that be, which decides what's art and what's not. Yours not to reason why, yours not to ask, for have you gone to Europe and seen the wonderful art galleries and contemporary art there? What? How dare you ask if what Europe does is always right!
Enjoy art? What rubbish. Art is no more to enjoy. It is to point out defects in history, not to draw a single line that the masses may, God forbid, recognise and make installations that are puzzles akin to the Gordion knot.
To bring attention to the artist by declaring that all the world's problems are felt by the artist keenly and he suffers pain on behalf of them, that's the contemporary art scene. Ah...the pamphlet will tell you what the artist actually intended to tell you, if you think his/her work is bizarre. Well, is the pamphlet then the real art, if it communicates? Tough question that!
We were at the biennale too, paying hundred rupees each today. The first leg (for us), of the Kochi Biennale, at the Durbar Hall Art Centre. The biggest room had a few wonderful works that were new in execution and enjoyable, using charcoal, archival glue and oil. Here is the image. Stand far away from the huge work and you realise how well the artist worked.
. The first gallery showed a long white table with a few white ceramic objects, that were purportedly made from a very thick Indian history book. A video showed us how the artist managed to do it, dabbing it with clay and burning off the history pages to get those white masses arranged on the long table. "They look like paratta dough," said a spectator who wondered what the brouhaha was all about. See if you agree:
In the last gallery downstairs, even if you read what it's all about, you will be all at sea. (I have forgotten what it said. Anyway it's immaterial) Globes, globes and globes, with aesthetics missing. An ugly table below. Try hard as you might, the penny won't fall.
Is it evolution of art or degeneration? Is it moving away from the kernal to the husk? Or is it simply embracing something new regardless of whether logic is attached to it? Or is it plain fashionable to follow the trends set by other countries and cliques that have become self-proclaimed custodians of art? A dispassionate analysis of what makes sense and what does not is called for. Aesthetics is one thing and novelty for novelty's sake is quite another. When academics and organisers pontificate on art and criticism is balked at, art ceases to reach the common man.
Upstairs, an artist has used the plain white rice, millions of them, glued together in a pattern on huge canvases, with teeny weeny texts making lines to demarcate the sections. The text are sometimes wise sayimgs and other times, come right from the artist's heart. A magnifying glass rests at the bottom of the work, imploring you to please read the text. There are local artists in many places who engrave full figures and write names on a grain of rice. But they are not educated enough or in the art circuit to find a place here. Or else some term it craft. Can craft be in any way a second cousin of art? Pause, ponder.
We are yet to see the Fort Kochi part of the show. Hope it will be better.
Prema Manmadhan
Everything about the biennale is new. The biennale brings to the frog in the pond that is you, art as is envisaged by the powers that be, which decides what's art and what's not. Yours not to reason why, yours not to ask, for have you gone to Europe and seen the wonderful art galleries and contemporary art there? What? How dare you ask if what Europe does is always right!
Enjoy art? What rubbish. Art is no more to enjoy. It is to point out defects in history, not to draw a single line that the masses may, God forbid, recognise and make installations that are puzzles akin to the Gordion knot.
To bring attention to the artist by declaring that all the world's problems are felt by the artist keenly and he suffers pain on behalf of them, that's the contemporary art scene. Ah...the pamphlet will tell you what the artist actually intended to tell you, if you think his/her work is bizarre. Well, is the pamphlet then the real art, if it communicates? Tough question that!
We were at the biennale too, paying hundred rupees each today. The first leg (for us), of the Kochi Biennale, at the Durbar Hall Art Centre. The biggest room had a few wonderful works that were new in execution and enjoyable, using charcoal, archival glue and oil. Here is the image. Stand far away from the huge work and you realise how well the artist worked.
Is it evolution of art or degeneration? Is it moving away from the kernal to the husk? Or is it simply embracing something new regardless of whether logic is attached to it? Or is it plain fashionable to follow the trends set by other countries and cliques that have become self-proclaimed custodians of art? A dispassionate analysis of what makes sense and what does not is called for. Aesthetics is one thing and novelty for novelty's sake is quite another. When academics and organisers pontificate on art and criticism is balked at, art ceases to reach the common man.
We are yet to see the Fort Kochi part of the show. Hope it will be better.
Prema Manmadhan
