IN TRANSITION: NEW ART FROM INDIA, Richmond Art Gallery, Richmond, BC, May 1 - June 13, 2010

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"Taj-Mahal"

Sudarshan Shetty and Reena Saini Kallat, "Taj-Mahal," 2008 Installation, 83.9" x 68.9" x 171.3".

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"National Highway No.1"

Shilpa Gupta, "National Highway No.1," 2008. En route Shrinagar to Gulmurgh, Single channel DVD video projection.

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"Taj-Mahal"

Sudarshan Shetty and Reena Saini Kallat, "Taj-Mahal," 2008 Installation, 83.9" x 68.9" x 171.3".

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"Loco - Foco – Motto"

Hema Upadhyay, "Loco - Foco – Motto" (installation shot), Hema created a site specific sculpture for RAG sculpture Matchsticks, Glue, Wooden Frame, steel cable.

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IN TRANSITION: NEW ART FROM INDIA

Richmond Art Gallery, Richmond, BC

May 1 - June 13, 2010

By Helena Wadsley

Artists from India have recently made a grand entrance into the international, avant-garde art scene. Milan, Tokyo and London have held major exhibitions showcasing contemporary Indian art, and have included several of the artists participating in In Transition: New Art From India at the Richmond Art Gallery. The Saatchi show in London ended a week after In Transition opened, which might explain why artist Hema Upadhyay, was seated on the floor of the gallery when I visited, constructing her matchstick chandelier, Loco-Foco-Motto, the red tips giving the piece a festive air. Fire and its potential implied in the unlit matchsticks, is an important element of Hindu ritual, symbolizing creation and destruction. Double meaning is a common element in the works in this exhibition.

The seven artists featured in In Transition blend a post-modern conceptual vernacular with social and political issues – subtly, in the case of Upadhyay, and not so subtly by TV Santhosh - Living with a Wound is three panels of scrolling text in LED lights describing the exploitation of a prisoner for medical experimentation hovering above three coffin-sized blocks of bones cast in fibreglass. Shilpa Gupta’s National Highway #1 (En Route Srinagar to Gulmurgh) is a video shot from a vehicle as it speeds through the disputed region of Kashmir. Through the camera’s eye, we see trees and houses - normal roadside scenery - but the image frequently stutters, sounding like a machine gun, whenever a soldier appears in the viewfinder.

Artists Thukral and Tagra’s Keep Out of Reach of Children (Tank), speaks to the economic growth spurt India has experienced due to its strong manufacturing industries, the result of an abundance of cheap labour. Their piece, at first glance appears to be a retail display of stacked, cheerfully-coloured packages; only when you stand back does the image of a tank appear.

Although Sudarshan Shetty and Reena Saini Kallat both use the Taj Mahal, a monument that symbolizes India and love in their art, their messages are very different. Shetty’s wall of miniature models refers to the weakening of the once-powerful symbol through commercialization, while Kallat examines the convergence of private and public with her marble-bead silhouette of the Taj Mahal and photographs of ‘love-graffiti’ scratched into public places.

For the better part of the last century, Indian artists have struggled to create their own national style; movements such as the Bengal School of Art in the early twentieth century looked back to tradition and spirituality that the British (during their period of Colonial rule) ignored in setting up an art education system that suited their own tastes. By the 1960s, artists looked to traditional styles such as the Mughal miniature paintings, but added a modernist aesthetic. While India has experienced rapid economic growth that has provided artists with the means to make ambitious works, globalization has also allowed a fertile cross-pollination. India remains a country of contradictions; growth has not diminished poverty or eased social injustices, but it has challenged spirituality and tradition. Despite the vast geography of India, a tight-knit community of contemporary artists has evolved.

The six pieces in this exhibition were selected to be part of Vancouver’s 2010 Biennale, in-TRANSIT-ion, a showcase of public art around the theme of mass-transit routes. Though unsuitable for the outdoors, this group of work was considered too important to omit. Vancouver and its surrounding communities, for the most part, are places of privilege compared to India, where poverty remains largely undiminished despite recent economic prosperity in some sectors. In Vancouver and Canada, we are a vibrant community comprised largely of people from elsewhere. While the exhibition’s title In Transition, borrows from the Biennale’s title, it also refers to the changes India is undergoing and the fluid exchange of ideas taking place between eastern and western cultures.