I have always been a supporter of the drive to document. In the case of Bollywood memorabilia, it was the film stills exhibited by Bobby Kohli at the Vision Gallery at Delhi some years back, and documented, exhibited and auctioned by Nevile Tuli from Mumbai recently with its final big sale by Bowring?s, has shown us that even Kitsch, well-documented and understood, becomes good sales material. How much better the results could be if the same attention that is being given to cinema posters is lavished on documenting good art.

In fact, this does not require a foundation or a big auction house. What it requires is a body of work that is consistently produced over the years; a capacity to understand the importance of different works in a sequence and of the body of work in the history of contemporary art; and then, of putting together the whole for view as a statement that makes the work something worth investing in.

?Swayambram? by Gogi Saroj Pal

This statement could be made in an auction, or a website or as an exhibition. And it does not require enormous outlay. I saw this in Gogi Saroj Pal?s latest exhibition of a signed limited edition of digital prints. A very limited number of each (10) have been signed and put up for sale at affordable prices that range between Rs 60,000 for a large print on canvas of the Swayambram series to a smaller one (half the size at Rs 30,000) to single prints at Rs 20,000 each, on canvas.

The quality of the printing is good and the works are almost indistinguishable from her gouaches, five of which are on sale, three small ones at Rs 40,000 each and two large works at Rs 2,25,000 each. So it is evident that her signed edition of digital prints are an affordable version of some of her best work.

Her work exhibited here spans at least three decades of following the theme of representing women in Indian society. It starts with the bird-woman series, using a metaphor that goes back to the past, with the popular practice of nailing a torana to the door of a bride?s home, reminding us that the ?bird had flown.?

The theme of the bird-woman goes deep into antiquity with Greek legends of the harpies. But the strength of its survival is quite extraordinary, coming down to us with women being called birds in English slang even today.

Then we have the tree nymphs and the cow-woman, the Kamdhenu image, with the woman like the long-suffering holy cow, providing nourishment uncomplainingly. The transition from these images is worked out through a series of women with tigers or leopards. The portrayal is clearly of the woman as a repository of strength, but as in the case of devis ? worshipped as images and oppressed in life-always in the hands of men.

It is from here that we progress to her portrayals of the contemporary woman. From the female centaur willfully handing over a ?licence to ride? to a male figure on her back. This image again hides a powerful social currency in the slang phrase for ?forward? women, describing them as ?horsey.? From there, we have representations of women calling for attention, either by clapping their hands or cupping the hand by the mouth to call.

Then there are playful pictures of ?girls in a girl?s world,? playing hop-scotch or standing alone, harking back to dreams of a ?women?s world? that have been with us since the 18th century. But the most realistic expression is that of women sitting in a gathering of men, standing out visibly as either listeners or being ignored. Then there are two poignant images: one of a woman in white being massaged by a bearded man (a recognition of her role when she is on the way out?) and a Madonna and child image, where the woman stands erect, offering up her child to the world of men, of wars and trials of all sorts. But the curious thing is that she is neither downcast nor unhappy. She is stoic about the future – a future that men and women will struggle to make better together.

This exhibition shows Gogi Saroj Pal as one of the more significant artists who deals ith the complex condition of women in history: from being rooted tree-goddesses, the first farmers and earth mothers, to being destabilised as birds in their parental homes and cows in those they are married into under patriarchy, and finally, as equals in a crowd.

One must congratulate this very sensitive and perceptive artist for evolving a method by which even those who cannot afford an original are able to enjoy her work ? not at throw-away prices but at affordable ones. This exhibition will definitely convince investors of the soundness of her work and extend its knowledge beyond its present limits. Hope the archival exhibition will become a model for other artists as well.