Any market needs to be sustained by at least three elements: The producers, the marketers and the users. The art market is no exception. Its responsibility is shared by the artist, the gallery owners and the collectors. And the responsibilities are very different indeed.
The artist?s responsibility is, of course, to ensure the quality of the work. It must have a certain technical excellence. This does not mean it should be academic. On the contrary, works that are academic mostly fail to make the grade. An artwork must express a close connection of the artist with ongoing life. And good technique is merely the instrument of this. The artist?s sharpness for perceiving the subtleties of reality around him or her and expressing them in as excellent a manner as possible is the first premise of a good work of art.
Then, there is the question of whether such a vision is relevant for the future. Would people beyond the present relate to a work of art? How does one assess that? First, and perhaps the safest way, is to look at a work of art in relation to the art tradition it has developed out of. For our contemporary art, it means the emergence of a global art that challenged the imposition of standards by the elites of dead and dying empires and sought out the sensitivities of those close to the soil who produce the wealth of the world.
They are the factory workers, artisans, farmers, agricultural labourers, technologists, fishermen and forest people. Their art and life has inspired some of the best artists in the world, like Gaugin, Van Gogh, Cezanne, Picasso and Klee. In our country, the trend has been more powerful with artists like Ramkinker Baij, FN Souza and MF Husain coming from the people. And others like Jamini Roy, Nandalal Bose, Rabindranath Tagore, SH Raza, Bhupen Khakhar and Tyeb Mehta being inspired by them. Also, the wealth of visual traditions to be inspired by has helped our contemporary artists make their mark in the global art of today. There are very few countries that can match the variety of expressions that India is gifted with. And our contemporary artists have made full use of these. Finally, there is the question of originality. It is extremely difficult to be original without being seduced into gimmickry. And some of our best artists sink to it. But mercifully, there is enough that is original in Indian contemporary art to keep it going.
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Horse: Watercolour on paper by Ramkinkar Baij |
As regards galleries, I am happy to see them rising above the level of shops. Ibrahim Alkazi, Kekoo Ghandi, Kali Pundole, Virendra Kumar, Ravi Jain, Katayun Saklat and Prashant Kejriwal can be seen as the basis of the laying down of an all-India network of art galleries. Today, many more are there in the field like Renu Modi, Arun Vadhera, Shobha Bhatia, Sidhartha Tagore, Ashish Anand, Payal Kapoor, Sunaina Anand and Sharon Appa Rao, to name only a few. There is no dearth of gallery owners and our contemporary artists need not fear lack of exposure. In fact, too much exposure often tends to talent being spread out too thin.
Many of these galleries bring out catalogues regularly with their exhibitions. Others maintain meticulous records of works in stock and those sold by them. They issue documents of authenticity and even sponsor books. This has helped create a sound body of material to access good contemporary Indian art. There are very few ?unknowns? today and of the known artists, one can no longer count them on the fingers of one hand. This has made our art worth investing in. The result is that galleries as far a field as Singapore, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Kuwait, Paris, the Hague, London, New York and San Franciso, stock Indian contemporary art.
This could not have happened without collectors. And the major ones like Rusi Modi, Masanori Fukuoka, Chester and Davida Herwitz and a strong group of Indian NRI?s have ensured that Indian contemporary art has a rooted position in world contemporary art today. What is more, they have had the vision to invest in the art of the anti-imperialist movement that finds common ground with the European avant garde of the inter-war years and that of the Japanese renaissance. And, of course, they have earned good profits from this.
Of late, I have heard a lot of carping about the lack of art criticism. A charitable view is that critics must criticise. The uncharitable view is that those whose vision has sunk into the dustbin of history are upset. Either way, it is a proof that there is enough criticism around to keep our eyes open and the year 2004 ought to see progress in our contemporary artistic development unless we foul the space with wrong political and economic choices.