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Last week just after my Thursday class at institute I left
for Cochin for my much delayed visit to Biennale at Mattanchery and Fort at
Cochin. Interestingly before I left, in
the class room back at Bangalore the students
were working on a series of art maps taking Yelahanka new town 5th
phase colony as an example to highlight the point -why this world is designed
only for twenty five year old patriarchal masculine capable youth and not for
anyone else. This mapping is part of classroom assignment from the art course
‘Sound of silence’ in foundation. The interesting aspect of this small stretch
of Yelahanka new town 5th
phase is – there are multiple educational institution – two primary schools,
one high school, one school of visually challenged, one design school, Nursing
school, one Hospital, one bus stand,
Multiple temples, one mosque, one
church, many eating joints, market, many
gardens and housing colonies in this small stretch of land.
It is a planned part of a big city one could say in confidence, but
strangely still students found out that
it is a place meant only for a twenty five year old patriarchal
masculine capable youth and not for anyone else.
It was an interesting art engagement before I left for
Cochin Muziris art biennale and when l reached fort the first sight I got was a
set of wall drawings by small kids with a noting under that declare –
Children’s biennale 2015. As the day progressed from morning to noon and noon
to evening, I took a long stroll around art works spread across many sites in Mattancheri, experiencing not only the art by children and youth but also by the old and mature minds.
There were these intellectual deliberations and discussions, film festivals, music
programs, public art projects, curated student’s biennales along with other
exhibitions independently curated by individual galleries and institutions as Biennale
collaterals in galleries taking place around the mattancheri sites. And among those historical building collaterals,
unlike any other design experiences known under different names, one could
confidently say that this biennale is certainly a very well crafted art engagement
than many others. Unlike our cities as a
planned design experience meant only for twenty five year old patriarchal
masculine capable youth, there is certainly a degree of inclusiveness and
artistic liberty evident everywhere at Cochin – Muziris biennale.
Before I left Aspin wall I had a brief interaction with artist Bose Krishnamachari and a long conversation with artist Riyas Komu, the founding members of Cochin Muziris Bienalle and Jitish Kallat, the curator of the Biennale. In the evening before retiring to my friend’s place for the much needed sleep after a day long inconclusive artistic exploration and sitting next to Aspinwall building near the shipping channels, like those ships I loaded and unloaded many theoretical and philosophical concerns of contemporary art .
Keeping the biennale and this discussions on the backdrop this essay tries to understand Indian contemporary art and its concerns, a favorite subject of mine over the next few days.
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Mutuality of artistic liberty and inclusiveness
