A search for Indian contemporary art throws up many links for Indian (American) art and a precious few which lean more towards the East. Here is a review of four sites on Contemporary Indian Art. An interesting site is Maya at www.southasia.com /maya which acts as an umbrella for various galleries who want a presence on the net. From Maya, you have access to participating galleries and artists who have put up exhibitions on this site. It was set in 1995 by Ravin Agarwal, a partner in a venture capital firm in Los Angeles who has a strong interest in Indian contemporary art. The site is maintained by Cyberworks, Calcutta, and Agarwal informs you that it has an open submission policy it will review any artist who is an Indian or covers Indian related theme. The five shows on currently are of galleries and artists who are Calcutta based. Besides posting a sufficient number of works on the net, Maya also provides the background of individual artists. The strong point of Maya is the large number of artistsit represents. The site design is such that you'll not remember it the moment you switch screens. Perhaps a deliberate attempt to let the paintings take centre stage. While this does not add value to the site, it does not take anything away either.
If a mouse potato from some far flung corner of the world should run a search on Indian contemporary art, he'll probably come away with the impression that almost all Indian artists live in Calcutta. Along with Maya, Chitrakoot at www.chitrakoot.com is another extensive forum for Bengal artists. Set up by Paraksah Kejriwal and Sumitra Kejriwal, who run a gallery by the same name in Calcutta, Chitrakoot features some 16 artists including Bikash Bhattacharjee, Ganesh Haloi, Sanat Kar and Sunil Das. The best feature of this site are the personal statements made by artists which make for interesting and informative reading as it gives clues to the sensibilities of painters working in contemporary India. Nicely designed by Internet Resources, Mumbai, Chitrakoot sticksto its focus throughout, making it easy to navigate.
A single-mindedness which SPEAR (Skypak's project for enhancement of art realisation) lacks. Set up by Skypak, the courier company -- advertisements of the organisation's various activities, messages about its commitment to art, and links to the page which list the awards won by the site -- crowd almost every frame. Skypak's initiative to set up a museum of contemporary art is commendable but the site needs some cleaning up. Fortunately once you manage to get inside the museum, SPEAR's lavish spread makes you forget the previous clutter. It has paintings by Anjolie Ela Menon, (also covering her December 1997 exhibition in Jehangir Art Gallery), N S Bendre, Prabhakar Barwe, Sanjay Bhattacharayya, Satish Gujral, M F Husian, S H Raza, Deepak Shinde and Laxman Shreshta. SPEAR has picked up the giants of Indian art and its choice of art works, presented in a large size, makes for a great visual treat. Designed well by CyberAds Studio, it is definitely worth acouple of tours.
Archer at www.archerindia. com is an extension of the Archer Group which runs a gallery and a graphics workshop in Ahmedabad. The basic intention of the site was to broaden the consumer base of the gallery. Reasonably sized reproductions of works are put up along with a brief on the artists. You can buy paintings of Bhupen Khakkar, M F Husain, Amit Ambalal, Haku Shah and others on this site.
Where all these sites fail is in giving a greenthumb a background of the Indian art scene which might help the viewer appreciate the paintings better. They rarely go beyond resumes of the artists and critical comments find no space here. These sites have done a good job of catching the Indian artists on the net but haven't managed to give them an individual voice. But that extensive bodies of works by Indian painters are up on the net for a world audience is a step in the right direction -- something which these four sites have done quite well.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
