India Art Summit 2009--II

This was the second edition of Art Summit. Certain strains were visible in this Summit. There was overwhelming desire to execute installations and sculptures among artists. The celebration of gay and lesbian in art was more remarked even among artists who claim no knowledge of minority sexuality. I think it is done to be fashionable. The experiences that create art with alternate sexuality can not be Xeroxed by the 'Straight'.
Certain artists used material as their USP rather than the expression/imagination. I hold Damian Hirst responsible for creating the craze for the material at the expense of creativity. Otherwise how his $100 million precious stone studded skull will hold ground. there are quite a few in India who are trying to just do that.
The opening session on day first was reserved for VIPs, whatever it means in terms of art and aesthetics i do not know. But I know for sure a large number of very serious/good artists were kept out by Special Invitations Syndrome. A Van Gogh if their is any in India will not get invited to the opening which included presentations/talks by Collectors/artists/ curators/art writers and critics.
The VIP invitations make such events more exclusive than inclusive.
coming to International art one must appreciate the organizers that they could get more foreign art and galleries. It was also good to see foreign galleries showcasing Indian artists and Indian galleries exhibiting foreign artists. Though in recent past Arun Vadhera had in collaboration with Grosvener gallery U.K. had brought works of Picasso, Francis Bacon and Lucien Freud to Indian art lovers, the Summit also had works of Picasso, Dali, Andy Warhol and a number of others. I must appreciate the growing interest at home in big names especially in artists of Indian orgin. Anish Kapur had a very successful sale run of the works exhibited. Matter of fact if I understand correctly a substantial amount of money out of total sales was generated by Picasso, Dali, Anish Kapur and other greats. This is a welcome addition to the visual vocabulary of art aficionados.
About contemporary or Modernist senior artists there seemed an amnesia. It was not that the M.F. Hussain's work were not exhibited other greats like Ram Kumar, Akbar Padamsee, Jogen Choudhry,Raza and many many more had small or no representation in the Summit. But then the galleries have to go by fashion also. I must here mention Ashish Anand of DAG whose affable mother(who started the Gallery) I knew decades back and who must have learnt to spot sterling art early in life. He had put up considerable and very good art spanning a long period of time. His exceptional collection included a very lyrical abstract landscape by Raza apart from Souza, Robin Mandal, Sunil Das, Amitava, Himmat shah and a galaxy of other greats.
There are shortcoming in any new venture and present Summit being no exception. But one appreciates that it has created a meeting ground for those associated with fine art in any capacity. The greatest joy was to run into inquisitive children shepherded by parents, large posse of art students and ofcorse artists from all over the country and abroad.
For the first time in India one can view at one place and critically examine the kind of art that is being created. The Art summit definitely despite shortcoming is bulding the necessary infrastructure for seeing and appreciating art.
Kudos!

India Art Summit Delhi 2009

Assembling this work of art in Europe in Austria I used discarded German truck MAN front cover. I liked the symbolism of Man and the circular spool about the Cycle of Man-Nature. Inset in oval is evocation of landscape. The colours in my palette symbolize the serenity(Blue) and joy(red yellow)

Artist Viktor Vijay
MAN German truck front cover, wooden spool, Acrylic paint and canvas
Assemblage in St Michael Austria
Work in collection of Anton Mayer


Art Fairs exert a lot of pressure on legs as on heart. This i know from art fairs in Europe and Museum Night or from Open Studios that is a common practice in West for getting people to know art and artists.
Apart from meeting the community, I did find some very refreshing works by artists who are not even known. Name is the result of umpteen repetitions and one can find the same in case of the art that is churned out as Pavlovian conditioned. But name in modern times is created and destroyed in short spans of time.
I discovered a kind of digital-computer Neo-realism that offers blind servility to the technology in a large number of cases. But there are Gladiators par excellence like Rameshwar Broota. His work combining camera and computer work creates surrealistic imagery. The print on paper evokes human limbs through moulded steel pipes.
More like fast food art is being dished out by a blind use of technology. On to many such works I could not find the soul. Intimidation and shock work were aplenty to make the viewer acquiesce.
I must come back to you after my mind and body plays out the art fatigue.
Till then--
Ciao

An Artist Ruminates—Landscapes on Fire

Acrylic on handmade paper size 22"X28" each work

Landscapes on Fire

Rust coloured autumn warmth,Tatra Mountains on fire, green forest in Finland fighting a losing battle with emerging passionate red, crimson, ochre and orange, the landscape in Piedmont in Italy audaciously confronting like a sensual hot damsel, streaks of fiery colours in the greens around Danube near Braila in Romania, the cool Mediterranean blue set against energetic warm breathing Taurus Mountains in Kemer in south central Turkey, the scintillating fragrance of forest in September in Salzburg in Austria are etched like some master etchings in my soul. They are durable and permanent as long as I am. But then they will outlive me through my warm European abstract landscapes that are inspired by colourful Nature in Europe.
The languid long wine and vermillion sunsets spring suddenly whispering silhouetted joys. Unbridled passion is evoked in me by the noble hearted maiden-Europe nay Europa and I am left ruminating about her charming body and soul that she vivaciously flaunts. How do I find another like this?
I live her and return to her charm in my paintings ‘Landscapes on Fire—Europe as I see her’.
It is not the Nature, land and culture but also the ateliers of friends where I worked, glasses of wine, music and dance, shared love and laughter, swimming in Mediterranean, exploring ancient Roman amphitheatres and aqueducts, visiting galleries and museums, meeting and parting are the little nuggets of diamond joy tucked inside me forever.
Art emerges from the experience and evocation. And I have life full and overflowing with them. From the Journey of an Artist emerged refreshing landscapes.
It was a beautiful land—rolling hills, sensuous, fragrant valleys, exquisite sunsets, white winters, warm summers, scintillating springs and brown ochre romantic autumns. It was a land where love grew in the form of fragrant linden flowers; flowing brooks, singing canaries, jingling bells, nature composed music—as cows grazed in the lush meadows and virginal winds kissed endearingly every blade of grass, every flower in bloom and every leaf of tree.
It was in this fecund land that I was born to my mother. In the nature's nursery here, my childhood was nursed. It was here that I played with squirrels and birds, collected wild flowers, raced with the winds, watched fishes gambol in streams, and learnt my lessons about colours from changing seasons.
I live these landscapes and return to them through my art.

Ruminations by Artist

I felt a new, resurgent energy. I put a new canvas on easel. The passion of winter sun, aroma of burnt grass, and the fragrance of Ruhi coursed sweetly through me. I painted with this happy feeling, of proximity to nostalgia of beauty. I painted on. When I looked out of my studio window, the evening sun was spreading its vermillion bounty on the landscape; families of cranes flew in formation back to their nests and waiting chicks. Slowly and stealthily with cat’s paws, the evening silhouettes were advancing to steal the lustre and light from the departing sun. It was a moment, a still, unmoving moment. A moment of nostalgia, pain, and craving, it was. It was a totality—an infinity in finitude, or so I felt. How fragile is the existent, hardly we become familiar with it that it vanishes. Fragilities are born incessantly and they die and enter the infinity. What if I could catch infinity through fragility or to have a glimpse of the eternal while fragility transmits itself in to the eternal? What was I looking for, eternity in the moment or a glasshouse full of inconstant images? I shut the window, cleaned my brushes, locked the studio, and stepped out in the street. The life flowed in the street, stray animals lazing oblivious to the goings on around them, people rushing with the business of life, hawkers touting their ware with loud shrill voices, children playing games, little roadside stalls offering hot food to the hungry. This was one frame, one painting of the fragile time. How would I catch the glimpse of the eternal from these vanishing moments? That was my search, and that's what I had to paint. Such big quantity of time had always been passing in fragility. Yesterdays were mere specks of memories stringed together, existing in, but emptiness

Dusk 102"X56"

blue moon AGAIN

A Face kissed by Light and fragrant Wind

Artist Viktor Vijay
SOLD
Togetherness
Acrylic on canvas
size 66"X60"

Two is not a duality always. Two is togetherness too. Like flowers and their fragrance, sky and earth, wind and water, body and soul, man and woman, love and sharing, sleep and awakening,, action and rest, song and music, humans and the environment etc.
This painting is inspired by such feelings. There are two faces into sieve-light creating a musical cadence of Nature. We are happy to share to hold hands to sing together and to live together