By DR. TOM MACK
Art museum presents ‘Visions of India’, How do modern artists cope with the weight of history? This is a challenge particularly applicable to painters and sculptors who hail from countries with well-established and universally recognized artistic legacies. How, for example, do French painters emerge from the shadow of their Impressionist and Cubist predecessors? How do Italian sculptors make their own mark in a land where Michelangelo and Bernini still loom so large?
Some possible answers to this critical question can be found in the latest major exhibition at the Columbia Museum of Art, on view until Jan. 10. Titled “Visions of India,” this often-dazzling panoply of artifacts by some of the most important contemporary Indian artists provides a host of 21st-century responses to how those working in a long-established tradition might put their own stamp on the path-setting efforts of those who have gone before.
Anyone even casually familiar with the artistic heritage of the Indian subcontinent knows that the creative genius of that particular culture embraces not only painting and sculpture but also wood carving, textiles, ceramics and metalwork. The current show offers memorable modern variations on all of these creative forms; but perhaps the most notable, in both size and impact, are two that provide a technological twist to objects of timeless usage.
Of the six downstairs galleries devoted to this exhibition, which is culled from the nonprofit Pizzuti Collection in Columbus, Ohio, two are devoted to single pieces that are sure to be the highlights of any CMA visit in the coming months. The first is a monumental wooden archway by Mumbai-based artist Sudarshan Shetty, whose sculptural installations have garnered worldwide attention in the last 20 years. In this particular 2011 piece titled “For All That We Lose,” the viewer is confronted with an 11-foot-tall, two-sided, ovoid carving – each side features willowy trees with intricately intertwined branches – with a central entry point. Lest one indulge in the impulse to poke one’s head into the portal, however, a metal sword sways back and forth in the opening like a clock pendulum.
In this work, east meets west. To a hand-carved wooden decoration not unlike what might have once graced an ancient Indian temple or palace Shetty adds a mechanical function, thus transforming an object whose labyrinthine beauty compels closer inspection into something that is ultimately menacing. If one purpose of art is to evoke an emotive response, this seductive bower with its perilous core succeeds on a grand scale.
Another gallery-filling work that mechanizes a recognizable Indian form is Subodh Gupta’s “Sushi Conveyor Belt” from 2008. On a metal table nearly 23-feet in length are eight undulating conveyor belts whereon rest strategically placed towers of tiffin tins made of aluminum, steel and brass. Tiffin carriers, a kind of lunchbox generally consisting of two or three tiers of interlocking tins, each containing some ingredient of a hot meal, are common to the Far East; but they are said to have originated in India.
Gupta is a New Delhi-based artist best known for transforming everyday objects into something totally unexpected. In this case, he has taken the tiffin carrier one step farther, not only increasing the height – some measure 20 tins high – but also setting them in motion. From the vantage point of the average visitor standing on any side of the mechanized table, the tiered tins move past the eye like illuminated skyscrapers as seen from a small plane or helicopter on a nighttime urban overflight. In Gupta’s imagination, the quotidian becomes the stuff of magic.
In addition to these two large-scale showstoppers, “Visions of India” provides CMA visitors with many more examples of how contemporary artists have reimagined their country’s traditional arts and crafts by merging them with other cultural influences – some of the individuals in the current show have lived long outside of India or engaged in lengthy residencies abroad – or by infusing them with a modern edge.
Many pieces in the current show combine both approaches. Take, for example, K.P. Raji’s 2008 oil on canvas depicting a pair of young people “playing” with fire before a backdrop composed of a ruined wall and crater. The artist’s work, which in this case speaks of destruction and displacement, is inspired by the narrative content of classic Indian miniature paintings but with a twist courtesy of Western surrealism. While the young man employs an unorthodox method for extinguishing a blaze engulfing a doll house-sized structure, his canine companion stands sentinel while grasping in its open jaws a yellow ball emblazoned with the ubiquitous smiley face ideogram.
In its melding of the classic and the modern, “Visions of India” is one of the most engaging exhibitions mounted by the CMA in recent years. It offers a host of eye-pleasing, thought-provoking delights.
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