State of the Art

There are mixed reactions as artists and gallery owners come together for a mega-project for the Commonwealth Games

Organised by the Lalit Kala Akademi and sponsored by the Cultural Ministry, an ambitious project to feature a 100 artists and 11 galleries to come up with artworks that have sport and the Capital as their muse, is already underway. The project, set around the Commonwealth Games, has plans of not just hosting exhibitions, but also of mounting hoardings worth Rs 50,000 around the city.

"The Commonwealth Games Organising Committee is an entity unto itself and has different ways of functioning, hence we had to take it upon ourselves. This association marks a cementing of public-private partnership and an acknowledgment of the important role played by the private galleries in the furthering of Indian contemporary art," says Ashok Vajpeyi, chairman, Lalit Kala.

The artworks to be featured in the project cover a wide range of topics. On one end of the spectrum is artist Ranbir Kalekar's vision of the CWG: A mixed media painting titled Conference of Birds and Beasts. In this work the heritage of the city has been pushed to the back while the nightmare of unfinished urban structures loom large. Birds and animals populate this desolate landscape. "These 'creatures of the wild' are all from Delhi and I have invented a fable of them holding a conference on the outskirts of the city, because they too are being made homeless like the hawkers who have been evicted. Things don't seem to be in very good shape in the painting but it also has a seductiveness," says Kalekar, one of the 10 artists to showcase their works at Nature Morte gallery. The gallery will also feature photographs by Ram Rehman and Gauri Gill, media work by Mithu Sen, an installation by Probir Gupta and Jaganath Panda, besides works by Thukral and Tagra.

... contd.

ALSO READ

The Mall Picker

The Mall Picker

Mario’s Maximum City

Kabul Delight