Sana (South Asian Network For The Arts) by Khoj International Artists' Association

SANA South Asian Network for the Arts

iii

Copyright info All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, without permission in writing from the publisher. Sub editor: Gayatri Uppal, Simrat Duggal, Noopur Rawal Text editor: Nandita Bhardwaj

SANA: The South Asian Network for the Arts Edited by Pooja Sood

Design: Vivek Sahni Design Image credits: Cover: Anoli Perera, detail from Dinner for Six: Inside out, installation, 2007 All images courtesy Khoj International Artists’ Association, Vasl Artists Collective, Britto Arts Trust, Theertha International Artists’ Collective respectively ISBN: 978-81-909761-4-5

contents IX

Acknowledgements

Preface

probing the khojness of khoj

nancy adajania

mapping khoj : idea i place i network

pooja sood

collective histories : vasl and pakistani art

fatima quraishi

104

the art of change

quddus mirza with adeela suleman and gemma sharpe

117

theertha : a journey by a collective of restless artists

anoli perera

142

bangladesh art in retrospective

abul masur

152

then and now : a brief historical examination of art in bangladesh

ayesha sultana

167

extending and expanding the idea and space

tayeba begum lipi

vii

acknowledgements On behalf of SANA, I would like to thank the Ford Foundation for believing in us for 6 long years which enabled our network to grow and made this publication possible. Thank you also to Triangle Arts Trust for their invaluable support in nurturing the network over so many years. The SANA publication is a collaborative effort across 4 countries. A labour of love, it would not have been possible but for the commitment of all the SANA members. Each organization commissioned its own texts and worked diligently to send images and texts, correcting and re-correcting proof after proof despite all the pressing demands on their time. The number of people who need to be acknowledged in each country is too long to list here – but to say - that without the commitment of each individual across our various borders, this book would never have been possible.

viii

preface This publication is a celebration of the coming together of a community of peers across South Asia who worked tirelessly over a decade to build what seemed impossible in a politically jaundiced terrain of prejudice and distrust. The making of the South Asia Network for the Arts (or SANA as it is fondly called by its members) is a celebration of this shared belief.

and above all, our persistence. With meager funding and an uncertain and often volatile political landscape, it speaks of the slow and painstaking process of how each organisation – and hence the network - was built over ten long years. Despite the difficulties, there was a palpable sense that if we persisted it would soon reach a ‘tipping point’ – a point when small things begin to make a big difference.

An intrinsic part of the global Triangle Arts Trust, the organisations which comprise SANA are Vasl in Karachi, Theertha in Colombo, Britto in Dhaka and Khoj in Delhi. Each organisation has made a significant contribution not only across its borders but also within its local context.

Today, when an Indian curator is invited to co-curate the Colombo Biennale and short collaborative projects between artists in Delhi and Lahore exist alongside year-long projects between artists from Bangalore and Colombo; when the largest collection of contemporary South Asian art is housed in Delhi and artists from across borders are household names, the ‘tipping point’ we had hoped for has been achieved. That this publication will be released in Dhaka at the Dhaka Art Summit amidst a showcase of art works by over 250 artists from South Asia, is a moment of joyous reflection - a celebration of our contribution to the burgeoning contemporary art scene in South Asia.

From its tentative beginnings in early 2000 as annual artist run workshops, each organisation has grown to occupy an important position within its artistic community. Today, amongst its many achievements, Britto has a building of its own and has curated the Bangladesh pavilion in Venice in 2011while Theertha, also building based, helped conceptualise the first Colombo biennale ; Khoj has acquired and refurbished its building into a purpose built art space which is a first in India and Vasl continues to be the hub for local and international artistic networks across Pakistan despite its precarious political situation. But for six crucial years from 2004 to 2011, the Ford Foundation provided much needed financial stability to the newly formed artist-run initiatives within SANA. A mobility fund allowed over 100 artists to participate in workshops, residencies and projects within the region. A digital network connected the region and an annual meeting, the venue for which was hosted by different member groups, provided us with the opportunity to brainstorm and ideate; to share our successes and challenges and set goals for greater interaction thereby building a much needed supportive structure for contemporary art in the region, where none existed before. The SANA publication is thus an embodiment of this shared commitment. A collaborative effort, it tells the story of our respective journeys: of how we began, our impetus, our individual histories, our growth, our varied and often difficult contexts, our many challenges

The initial need for the network fulfilled, closure, it seemed, was not just inevitable but necessary. Thus when funding from the Ford Foundation ended in November 2011, we formally announced the closure of SANA. While closure has meant a lack of funding for our annual meetings and for the mobility of artists in the region through our network, it has not meant a closure of the friendships that have been formed, nor the continued need to connect, nor indeed the shared responsibility we feel for each other in an increasingly polarised world. Maybe the time is ripe for a new avatar of SANA. Maybe closure is as invigorating as beginnings.

Pooja Sood Regional Coordinator (2000-2011) January, 2014

probing the khojness of khoj nancy adajania

The coming together of any group of creative minds must be celebrated as a festival of

The achievement of the Khoj model is that

brought Indian cultural producers into close

the imagination. The advent of the Khoj International Artists’ Workshop in 1997, where

it has transformed the lives and work of its

communion with their colleagues from other

a working group was formed comprising of six artists and a gallery director, established

practitioners. It has anticipated and provided

countries, breaking down the nation-centric

such a benchmark in the history of postcolonial Indian art.1

for the consequences of the mobility that

self-discourse then in force.

globalisation has imparted to artists in the Most artists’ groups or collectives that made an impact on the Indian art scene between

postcolonial world. By amplifying their context

The idea that one could work elsewhere, or

the 1950s and the 1990s were either voluntary associations, pressure groups or avant-

from nation to region to planet, Khoj has

collaborate with contemporaries from other

garde fronts. Except for the Kasauli Art Centre, which lasted the longest and eventually

produced a valuable platform and a network

societies, began to assume a reality. Regions

mutated into another avatar, most of them withered away or suffered an abrupt demise.

for Indian artists – one that gives them the

such as sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia,

In spite of their short life-spans, these initiatives generated productive conversations and

latitude, the depth of field and the tactical

which Indian artists had virtually ignored

alternative spaces of encounter outside of the gallery system and state-sponsored art

flexibility to deal with a range of emerging art-

under the influence of a Western ascendancy,

institutions. All of these groupings were born from an ideological impulse or responded

historical provocations. Over the years, Khoj

now became part of their active world-

to an immediate practical need. But Khoj is an exception to this rule. It is the Indian

has made them aware of possibilities that they

picture. Sculptors were able to experiment

manifestation of a portable model for trans-cultural artistic conviviality; a model that was

can pursue and artistic choices that they can

with installations, painters with ephemeral

originally developed by the New Yorkbased Triangle Arts Workshop in 1982, founded by

empower themselves to make. Thus, from an

performances – the rudiments of interactive

British sculptor Anthony Caro and businessman Robert Loder.

artistic situation that was many steps behind

and public art were set in place.

its Western point of reference for nearly four

To begin with, Khoj did not emerge from the needs of a group of local artists or in

decades, Khoj inaugurated the sensation of

In the process, the artists who have renewed

response to the challenges of an art-historical moment; rather, it presented itself as a

being many steps ahead. Its emphasis on

Khoj with every annual edition, and who have

prognostication and possibility. It looked forward to a utopian situation of dialogue

process, rather than product, liberated artists

participated in its growth, have negotiated

among artists from different contexts, who would not otherwise have come into contact

from the commodity focus of the gallery

numerous modifications of the template they

with one another.

system; its lively laboratory atmosphere

inherited from the Triangle Arts Trust. They

have brought, to this template, the desires and

individual artists who run it. This is just as well

of her contribution unfolded only gradually, even to her,

local exigencies that drive their practice.

in a country like India, where the leadership

rather than by design.3 Her dual education in art history

model is a charismatic one: institutions,

and management may have given her a special purchase,

Khoj’s specific history must be seen against the

especially in the cultural sector, tend to revolve

allowing for an intuitive grasp of emerging patterns in the

backdrop of Triangle interventions across the

around powerful individuals. When these

fast-changing India of the late 1990s. The cultural manager

globe. In 1995, the Triangle Arts Trust sent

individuals fade from the scene or pass away,

has emerged as a figure who can serve as the permanent

Indian artists to its workshops in Zambia, the

their institutions collapse or fall into desuetude.

axis of the organisation, even as the artists come and go,

UK, Namibia, South Africa, New York, the US

Perhaps this is the point at which to spell out

dividing their time between their own work and their Khoj

and so forth. Agter their trips, some of these

the ways in which Khoj is a unique form,

commitment in varying ratios.

artists were inspired enough to form a working

irreducible to other collective approaches.

group under Robert Loder’s guidance. The first

It is also crucial to highlight that Khoj is not a one-off or a

workshop was held in 1997, coincidentally on

First of all, Khoj is a feat of cultural

stand-alone performance; rather, it is part of a global network

the fiftieth anniversary of India’s independence.

management in a society that does not believe

of initiatives linked by familial relationships of motivation

Moreover, the site chosen for the workshop was

in managing its cultural expressions efficiently,

and similarities in structure and project execution. Thus, it

the bungalow of Sikribagh – a structure redolent

vacillating as it does between a marketing cult

does not exist in isolation but builds constantly – whether in

of feudalism and colonialism. Standing on acres

of genius and an ethos of coarse indifference.

intellectual capital, the flow of visiting artists or in stimuli

of land with a mango orchard and a pond, it

This may surprise the reader who regards

for innovation – from its continuous interaction with its

was made available by the Dayawati Modi

Khoj as an ‘artist-run initiative’. To my

counterparts elsewhere in the distributive system of the

Foundation for Art, Culture and Education in

mind it is more truly an association of artists

Triangle Arts Trust. This creates a corporate permanence

the defunct industrial township of Modinagar,

catalysed, facilitated and sustained by a

based on accountability and benchmarking that can endure.

outside Delhi. Ironically, this major art

cultural manager. The Indian art scene has

This goes against the necessarily limited life cycle of initiatives

workshop was going to take place on the debris

little by way of a serious understanding of the

founded on shifts of ideology within a tight circle, or on the

of the Nehruvian dream of industrialisation:

formative role to be played by such cultural

current interests of its participants, which they may well

the time had come for the nation to move on to

agents as critics, curators, conservationists

outgrow.

other dreams.

and cultural managers, who are all regarded

managing that unpredictable thing

as intermediaries between the sublime artist

However, some caveats would be in order. As Khoj settles

and the vast quotidian public. In truth,

down, transiting between its quintessential nomadism

these intermediaries bear the responsibility

and the attraction of anchorage, it must think through the

of transforming impulses into cogency, of

consequences of institutionalisation. Khoj in transit has

creating contexts in which individual artistic

organised five workshops in Modinagar since 1997, moving

projects can fulfil themselves.

to Mysore in 2002, then Bengaluru in 2003, Mumbai in 2005,

called art

Kolkata in 2006 and Kashmir in 2007. Khoj at anchor came Thus, in the Khoj narrative, director Pooja

about in 2002, with the establishment of Khoj Studios at

As a dynamic collective evolving into a cultural

Sood has played the pioneering role of a

Khirkee, Delhi, comprising six studios, an office and a gallery.

institution, Khoj is larger than the sum of the

cultural manager. Arguably, the importance

Khoj at anchor offers the same menu of choices that many other cultural institutions do: a cycle of film screenings, a series of talks, a programme of symposia and exhibitions. Will it then simply become a clearing house for spectacular events, so that its activities begin to read like a handbook of what’s salient at any given moment on the global art scene? Or will it build on the competencies and advantages honed during the last decade? A distraught artist who has been in the Khoj Working Group cautions us against the danger of its ‘Club Mahindra’ approach, its proclivity for turning a successful model into a universally executable programme irrespective of the locale. Khoj must discover life beyond the novelties of public or performance art. Sometimes, for instance, instead of being blasted by an eightchannel video presentation, we might prefer the fruits of silence and 2.

contemplation. So long as Khoj was in

transit, it could work temporarily in a regional milieu and move on, without

of approach, rhetoric and execution among them.

engaging critically with the problems

This is not going to be a simple chronology of their

of that milieu. At anchor, Khoj will

aims and missteps, since each had a core competency

have to address the consequences of

that we could absorb and take further into our

being a permanent participant in a

discussion of Khoj. I will not be discussing artists’

local context and the structure of its

circles whose discourse was inward and closed;

cultural politics. For this reason, Khoj

rather, I will be speaking of groups that discoursed

will soon have to produce a discourse

(or continue to discourse) outward, reflecting on the

of encounter, participation, insertion

relationship between art-making and other cultural

and engagement. For this reason also,

practices, and the interface between art activity

Khoj will have to accept the critic and

and a public sphere. These groups operated (or

theorist as equal partners with the

continue to operate) in that intermediate space of

1. Catalogue cover of the manifesto of Group 1890 for

artist in their creation and sustenance

sociality between the artists’ circle as an elite on the

the exhibition held at Rabindra Bhavan, Delhi, 1963

of an art world.

one hand, and such institutionalised forms as the

2. Group members of Group 1890 (top, left to right) Jeram

academy and the State-sponsored cultural agency.

Patel, Himmat Shah, Jyoti Bhatt (middle) Swaminathan, Rajesh

Crucially, these groupings have committed their

Mehra, Raghav Kaneria (below) Balkrishna Patel, Ambadas,

energies to sustaining a culture of conversation and

Gulammohammed Sheikh, SG Nikam (members not pictured)

It would be useful to study the questions and debates which emerged from

creative pedagogy that can, in turn, sustain cultural

M Reddeppa Naidu and Eric Bowen

the artists’ collectives that preceded Khoj, the similarities and differences

production.4

3. Group 1890: manifesto

‘ freedom from’ or ‘freedom towards’?

Before going on, I would like to make a slight

following artists’ groups have crossed the bridge

detour by meditating on the nature of freedom

that links ‘freedom from’ to ‘freedom towards’.

in relation to alternative art paradigms, practices and phenomena in the Indian art world. All

Group 1890, a formation that included J

advances in art since the 1880s have invariably

Swaminathan, Jeram Patel, Ambadas, Himmat

been expressed as articulations of a freedom

Shah, Gulammohammed Sheikh, Jyoti Bhatt

that is a ‘freedom from’: a freedom from the

and others, announced its manifesto in 1963.

constraints of prior modes of art-making,

They seemed to be committed to the project

framing or institutionalisation.

of a cultural modernity at once indigenous, autonomous and contemporary. They certainly

It could be argued that a conceptual problem

did not believe in leaving anything to chance,

haunts this sense of freedom – it is always

rubbishing all the dominant schools of art, past

freedom from something, a claim to leaving

and present. Sample this from their manifesto:

something behind that is nevertheless a continued enslavement to that which is said to

From its early beginnings in the vulgar naturalism

have been left behind. The distance sought to be

of Ravi Varma and the pastoral idealism of

mapped by ‘leaving behind’ is always defined by

[the] Bengal school, down through the hybrid

the source, not the journey or the destination. In

mannerisms resulting from the imposition of

this context, I would cite Krishnamurti’s central

concepts by successive movements in modern

teaching as a guide: ‘Freedom is something that is

European art on classical, miniature and folk

in the living active present, in daily life. Freedom

styles, to the flight into ‘abstraction’ in the name

is not freedom from something – freedom from

something is merely a reaction.’

and large has been inhibited by the self-defeating

Most avant-garde groups and practitioners react

Message from John Berger sent on the occasion of the First Triennale India at Rabindra Bhavan, Delhi, 1968

cosmopolitanism... modern Indian art by

purposiveness of its attempts at establishing an

retrieve alternative world views and forms of

many academy-trained Indian artists had

identity.

visuality from tribal and folk art; that they did

rigidly maintained their ‘autonomous’ position

not succeed is another matter. With all their

in society since the 1950s, this was the first time

violently to past art practices rather than, in Krishnamurti’s words, ‘dying to the past’ and

As Vivan Sundaram observes, ‘They [Group

energies concentrated on ‘freedom from’ the

the vocation of an artist was given practical

affirming the present. Dying to the past does not

1890] began on a radical note, but they ended

past, they never got their act going in the

shape as a workable livelihood model woven

mean obliterating the past, but dealing with it

in a neo-conservative Tantric mysticism.’

present.

into a local economy. Paniker viewed the artist

constructively and putting it behind us. It would

In retrospect we can see that Group 1890

be more instructive to perform art in the spirit

emphasised the importance of artistic practice

In 1966, the artist-pedagogue KCS Paniker

producer playing in a gamut of spaces from

of what Krishnamurti calls ‘freedom towards’

born out of choice, rather than the accretions

founded an artists’ village complex in

studio solitude to marketplace solidarity. He

something rather than always be haunted by

of cliché that went under the portmanteau

Cholamandal, near Madras. The artists were

provided for a stable economic situation that

the desire to achieve ‘freedom from’ something.

term ‘Indianness’ or Indian identity. In their

provided with residential and studio spaces

could sustain greater sociality between artists

This is easier said than done. Let us see how the

own boisterous manner, they were trying to

and could make craft-works for a living. While

and society at large. Later, Cholamandal also

not as an isolated genius but as a cultural

organised international art residencies. Their

for the visual arts, the Lalit Kala Akademi,

of resistance across the world. We must

among Indian artists about their position on

‘freedom towards’ was scored in the progressive

inaugurated the Triennale-India under Mulk

remember that this event was staged at the

internationalism and the role they could (or

politics of a critical regionality, but it gradually

Raj Anand’s visionary leadership in Delhi.

height of the war in Vietnam, with the Cold

could not) play in world art. It is important to

fell prey to the vagaries of the narrowly

Poet, art critic and distinguished arts editor,

War framing the revolutionary anti-colonial

record this moment in the late 1960s, because

provincial. The criticality ebbed away, the

Anand was a bridge figure between writers

struggles underway in many countries; the

it will clarify our analysis of the significance

regionality gained in strength and obduracy;

and artists, a cultural producer who shaped

imperialist-backed genocide in Biafra was in

of internationalism today, inflected as it is

once complacency set in, life improved but art

the Indian art world. He fully subscribed to the

its second year and the struggle of African-

with the economics of globalisation and its

deteriorated.

Nehruvian project of international solidarity

Americans for full civil rights in the USA had

attendant consumerist globalism. All such

among progressive forces. In February 1968,

entered a decisive phase.

phenomena form the context of Khoj as a

In 1968, the debates around nationalism and

he invited John Berger to contribute to the

internationalism, which had stimulated Indian

Triennale catalogue; Berger responded with

Vivan Sundaram, Gulammohammed Sheikh

debates around globalisation. All too often in

artists since Independence, were brought

an essay emphasising the power of modern art

and some of their contemporaries protested

India we sleepwalk through history without

to a head when India’s national academy

to oppose imperialism and to create an alliance

against the Triennale-India in 1971, citing

realizing the implications of what went before

what they saw as two major structural flaws in

us – of the struggles of understanding and self-

this project: first, that in its concern with the

assertion enacted by previous generations.

project and show its evolving position in the

international, it tended to overlook ‘India’s rich and complex civilisational history, and

In retrospect, the 1960s seem to have been

our Indian modernity with its own particular

quite productive in terms of artists’ initiatives;

history’; and second, that it was to be conceived

we have not yet begun to realise the crucial

and presented by the Lalit Kala Akademi,

importance of some of these. In 1969,

which was ‘run largely by bureaucrats at that

for instance, the painter Akbar Padamsee

date, [so] at the level of institutions, the protest

founded the Vision-Exchange Workshop.

was also to democratize the workings of the

This was a pioneering inter-disciplinary

Lalit Kala Akademi.’ Sundaram, who was

collaboration between painters, printmakers,

the secretary of the All India Artists’ Protest

filmmakers, a cinematographer, an animator

Movement, now concedes that Anand ‘put the

and a psychoanalyst, funded by Padamsee’s

Triennale-India on a world map. So maybe he

Jawaharlal Nehru Fellowship. There were

was a little ahead of us, in his understanding of

no curbs on artistic freedom: artists could

the need for a sophisticated internationalism.’

work collaborate and conduct ‘research’ into

new materials, media and contexts. Here, Despite its visionary beginnings, the Triennale-

the painter and video artist Nalini Malani

India has today lapsed into a mediocre

explored the grammar of filmmaking for the

representation of world art. Its historical

first time; the cinematographer KK Mahajan

Article by Stephen Kinzer, New York

Article on the Vision-Exchange workshop by Akbar

importance lies in its power to stimulate

worked with the painter Gieve Patel; the

Times, 1998

Padamsee in Citizen and Weekend Review magazine, 1968

an animated and self-conscious discussion

filmmaker Kumar Shahani interacted with the

psychoanalyst Udayan Patel to make a film based on a real life case-study,; his colleague Mani Kaul embarked on a suite of drawings while also making the critically acclaimed feature film Duvidha (1973). Padamsee himself made a few experimental films, including Syzygy in collaboration with the animator Ram Mohan and Events in a Cloud Chamber. In terms of actual outcomes, this workshop was not just a demonstration of artists working high-spiritedly across disciplines, which is how the term ‘interdisciplinary’ is misapplied in India even today. Rather, it was structured around the ‘boundary object’, the focus of research situated at the intersection between diverse disciplines.

1. Kasauli Art Centre: Artists, critics and friends at Indo-German

Padamsee could not sustain the workshop because, as he puts it, the artists were not ready to pull their weight in the management of the enterprise. Never again has such an adventurous and intense workshop situation

workshop, 1983 2. Cover of the Journal of Arts and Ideas

been repeated with such an intellectually vibrant constellation of cultural practitioners. Despite how short-lived it may have been, the Vision-Exchange Workshop gave the Indian art world its first taste of ‘freedom towards’.

Our next halt is Kasauli, associated indelibly

become Place for People – curated, in 1981, by a

with

and

collective that included six artists and the noted

substantial bridge-building between the field

critic Geeta Kapur. We invited people from

of art and the public sphere. As an artist-

various disciplines to come and speak, so BN

intellectual, activist and curator, Sundaram

Goswamy came and talked about miniatures,

has curated exhibitions and seminars, and

Jyotindra Jain also came and spoke. We had

organised artists into pressure groups to

the ‘Marxism and Aesthetics’ seminar for Social

fight against the bureaucratic indifference

Scientist, which was not part of the artists’

of art institutions, as well as the horrors of

workshop but ran parallel to it. Later, these

communalism.

multi-disciplinary

activities culminated in the establishment of

workshops and seminars he organised at

the Journal of Arts and Ideas in 1982, with the

Kasauli between 1976 and 1991, he helped

scholar-playwright GP Deshpande as its editor.

produce a space congenial to making art as

Its editorial collective included myself, Geeta

well as framing a discourse about art-making.

Kapur, Prasanna, Malini Bhattacharya, Anil

Vivan

Sundaram’s

the

consistent

Bhatti, Romi Khosla and Kumar Shahani, Sundaram set up the Kasauli Art Centre in

among others, representing the visual arts,

1976, in what had been his mother’s home, to

theatre, literature, architecture and film.

nurture collective art activity.9 His experience

We began to work, in these ways, on what

of participating in an anarchist commune in

would become a new position in Indian art –

London during the 1968 student movement

questions about the local, about various kinds

surely

of narratives, making references to different

informed

his

conceptualising

workshops on painting, sculpture, cinema and

periods of art history.10

theatre, and of symposia around larger issues such as gender, Marxism and aesthetics.

From

1979

onwards,

international

art

exchanges allowed artists from Europe to visit The Kasauli Art Centre, which I regard

Kasauli and Indian artists to travel, in turn,

as embodying the ‘freedom towards’ that

to Europe. Thus, German artists like Arwed

Krishnamurti spoke of, brought a diverse

Gorella and Siegfried Neunhausen (who was

grouping of interlocutors together. Their

President of the German Artists’ Union at that

exchanges provided the discursive basis for a

time) came to Kasauli. In 1982, Neunhausen

landmark exhibition on contemporary Indian

invited seven Indian artists (Nalini Malani,

art and, later, for a major journal. Sundaram

Sudhir Patwardhan, Nilima Sheikh, Jogen

recalls:

Chowdhury, Vivan Sundaram, DLN Reddy

KP Krishnakumar’s Young Man Listening , 1985

and Manu Parekh) to the Braunschweig In 1978, we began to formulate what was to

Academy of Art, where he taught. In the

following year, in 1983, seven German artists who taught at Braunschweig visited Kasauli. At Neunhausen’s suggestion, Sundaram curated an exhibition that pushed the boundaries of sculpture in terms of materials, ideology and form. Seven Young Sculptors (1985) included most of the participants in a workshop held at Kasauli a year earlier. Its catalogue essay was written by the art historian Anita Dube, who went on to become the spokesperson of the historic Indian Radical Painters and Sculptors Association, and later, a sculptor in her own right. The chief ideologue of the Radicals was the artist who

Krishnakumar, was

one

the

participants in Seven Young Sculptors.

short-lived

but vibrant collective, the Radicals accentuated the importance of overcoming artistic isolation, forming linkages with revolutionary impulses in society and developing image-making languages

that

were

informal,

tactical

and

communicative.

In January 1989, Delhi’s cultural sector was shocked into action by the murder of the young Communist theatre activist Safdar Hashmi, who was beaten to death by political thugs while staging a street play. In response, a number of cultural practitioners of broadly Leftist orientation joined together to form the Safdar Hashmi Memorial Trust, better known by the acronym SAHMAT. Defining itself as a ‘multi-arts solidarity platform’, SAHMAT called upon artists and activists to fight Participants of the Seven Young Sculptors Exhibition, Rabindra Bhavan, Delhi, 1985

against the rising forces of Hindutva. Its trustees included litterateur Bhisham Sahni, dramatist Habib Tanveer, actor MK Raina, theatre writer GP Deshpande, Hashmi’s widow Moloyshree

Hashmi, Hashmi’s brother Sohail Hashmi and Vivan Sundaram. SAHMAT’s lasting contribution has been to sensitise the Indian art world to a dangerously transformed political sphere and to mobilise resistance against an oppressive cultural politics. SAHMAT’s members were inspired by the realisation that, in such a situation, the questions of art-making were inseparable from those of activism. SAHMAT found some major contributors among the participants in the Kasauli experiment, which had nearly wound up by the end of the 1980s. Sundaram himself diverted his organisational energies from Kasauli into his work as a member-trustee of SAHMAT. It has been argued that some of SAHMAT’s methods and approaches are flawed, and that it has not always succeeded in its goals; however, a complete mapping and critique of SAHMAT lies beyond the scope of the present essay. 12 Another artists’ initiative, Open Circle, was launched in 2000 by Sharmila Samant and Tushar Joag, with Kausik and Mahua Mukhopadhyay as co-trustees; they were soon joined by Archana Hande and Shilpa Gupta. Open Circle was conceived as a platform where cultural expressions could be analysed in relation to the wider socio-political environment. Its interventions in the public sphere include exhibitions, conferences and workshops devoted to issues related to ecology, consumerism, communalism and censorship. Its consistent pursuit has been to find a language that can bridge the contending spheres of art and activism without privileging either over the other.

re - imagining a template The first Khoj workshop included participants like the radicals Anita Dube and CK Rajan. But Khoj is very much a creature of its own decade. Until the 1980s, it was possible to identify the ideological leanings of artists,

Broadsheet published on the occasion of an exhibition at the Town Hall, Calicut, 1988, by the Indian Radical Painters and Sculptors Association

depending on who read Scala, who read Span and who read neither. But in the 1990s, after the fall of the Iron Curtain, the reunification of Germany and the dismantling of the USSR, the ideological binaries of Left and Right

Protest against the ‘Timeless Art’ Auction at Sotheby’s Mumbai, 1989

Manifesto published for an exhibition at the MS University, Baroda, 1987

required urgent re-examination. In the early

never had its own version of Gutai, the Japanese

1990s, the destruction of the Babri Masjid by

art movement of the 1950s and 1960s, whose

the goons of Hindutva compelled artists like

members turned paintings into performance

Liberated from the white cube and its limited protocols

Vivan Sundaram and Nalini Malani to expand

props and whose performances radicalised

of engagement, some artists demonstrated a marvellous

their practice and explore media such as video

the

and

flowering at the first Khoj workshop. Manisha Parekh let

and photography to communicate with new

audience. Since the Indian modernist aesthetic

her paper works extend from the wall to the floor before

contexts and larger audiences. Art had to be

privileged the individuality of the artistic self,

bouncing off locally made stools. Surendran Nair assembled

taken out of the hallowed precincts of the

it precluded the formation of communicative

an allegorical parable from the feathers of a peacock, a

gallery but historically, in the absence of both

relationships between the studio artist and

peahen and a crow, hanging them from readymade belts

State funding for the arts and noncommercial

other cultural agents of the public sphere.

cast in aluminium. Gargi Raina, who has at various points

spaces that showcased alternative art practices,

These absences were not addressed until

in her career worked on the representation of ephemera like

the gallery had become a psychological fixation

the 1990s and were left virtually untouched

breath, water, light and a spider’s web, simulated the flow

for Indian practitioners.

even by the postmodernists who emerged in

of water on paper by deploying the silkenness of clay as

Bombay and Baroda during the late 1960s and

pigment. The sculptor Sudarshan Shetty worked with local

early 1970s.13

technicians Aas and Yasin to make an aeroplane that had

Artists of the early post-independence period

relationship

between

art-work

were trying to escape the social roles of the

serendipitously answered it.

the intensity of a primal arrow as well as the charge of a

artist as portraitist, society painter and national

economic

contemporary fantasy machine. Artists could access material

mouthpiece, while also erasing the lingering

liberalisation changed the look and content of

from the local market, which was a synaesthetic experience

image of the artist as folk artisan. With no other

print and televisual media at an accelerated

in itself. They also worked with local talent, technicians and

source of patronage, their sole goal was to be

pace. The technoscape was dominated by

artisans. Some, like Anita Dube, even had the desire to work

recognised by the gallery circuit. The artists had

major information technology corporations,

with a bird-catcher, although this project apparently never

to contend with a menaced sense of self. They

but their monopoly was challenged by the new

materialised. The total freedom of making art without any

were building their identity from fragmentary

heroes of the infotech world: hackers, copyright-

ideological pressure or intra-artistic group rivalry – and,

and fugitive materials, fashioning many selves:

defying pirates, exponents of the internet. New

more crucially, without the anxiety of performing to a

an artist self, a citizen self as well as a modern

technologies of communication and image

market – emancipated the artist to a considerable degree.

internationalist self. They took the vocation of

production were being widely embraced by

The fact that artists belonging to different nationalities could

art very seriously, as self-consciously ‘modern’

India’s large-scale informal economy.

eavesdrop on each other’s studios, however makeshift, forced

the

early

1990s,

India’s

artists striving for strict autonomy.

them to roll up their sleeves and talk about the work of art, The time was ripe to replace the gallery

rather than boast about the gallery-ready art-work.

They asserted their autonomy in a rather

object with the project and the market with

curious manner – by making paintings that

the community. Artists felt the lack of an

One of the early Khoj participants, Subodh Gupta, is

aspired to a universal internationalist style

alternative space but could not find the

today an internationally renowned artist. At the workshop,

(which was not, in fact, internationalist, but

practical means of articulating their need and

he made a very special site-specific work that could, in

West-centric) acceptable to galleries. This is

establishing such a space; Khoj, although not

retrospect, be regarded as a turning point in his career.

perhaps one of the reasons why Indian art

originally intended as a response to this need,

The circular enclosure, installed with bricks made of cow-

dung, was built like a monument to his childhood memories, redolent with

workshop) worked in cooperation with the

for the hosts, Dong left a curl of his breath

specific experiences of smell and touch. Cow-dung is invested with sacred

women of Modinagar, living on the workshop

within a sealed flask: an ode to immortality, or

properties but also has everyday uses in village life as a humble domestic

site. Shilpa Gupta reconstructed a toilet for

to the pursuit of impossibility.

fuel and an antiseptic. Gupta’s monument recalls and elevates this ordinary

the local female grass-cutters, against the

material into the orthodox hierarchy of art. But it is also an anti-monument,

estate manager’s wishes, and risked his anger

Subodh Gupta laid his childhood memories,

which breaks the artificial barrier created by the modern gallery between

further by casting her own breast in cement

invested in the sacred and the everyday,

an artwork and the viewer’s life-world: it invites her/ him to participate in a

and covering it with motor-wire, simulating the

literally to rest: he anointed himself in a paste

sensorium at once intimate and ephemeral, intensely real and yet perishable.

look of inconveniently sprouting hair. Gupta’s

of mud and cow-dung and lay down in the

intervention in this workshop space took the

yogic posture of a corpse, shavasana (‘Pure’,

That Khoj has made a contribution to the careers of several artists is beyond

form of giving something back to the local

1999). Like Dong’s bottling of air, Gupta

doubt. It has also opened out their horizons, so that they can acknowledge

viewer-users, but also leaving a fragment of

surrenders himself to gravity by adopting an

and empathise with the struggles of other marginalised cultures. Dube, who

her body as a sign of protest against a society

asana that implies a state of complete rest.

wrote the catalogue essay for the first Khoj workshop, especially singles out

that wishes to beautify its surroundings but

This act of no resistance on the part of the

the ‘African will to art’ displayed in the works of David Kolaone, Ludenyi

neglects the basic needs of its inhabitants.

artist is not a call for closure between artwork

Omega and Yoba Jonathan, who used poor materials such as old gunny

and viewer; in fact, it stills our senses so that we

bags, used tea bags and discarded window and door frames. ‘They could

The 1999 workshop in Modinagar stimulated

are forced to meditate on a relationship that

pick up junk fragments and weld them together, then paint them towards a

artists to make performance art from their

must be periodically replenished and polished

non-formalist narrative.’14

own cultural materials, whether that was

into a philosophical refinement.

Buddhist philosophy or yoga. The Chinese However essentialist this may seem, the effect of witnessing the ‘African will

artist Song Dong sat in a courtyard buzzing

In a recent Khoj workshop held in Kashmir,

to art’ and survival is affirmed by Manisha Parekh, who attended a Triangle

with people with his head pressed to the wall

Nikhil Chopra – a Kashmiri artist of Punjabi

Arts Workshop in Kenya in 1997, before the inaugural Khoj workshop that

in complete silence, over a period of ten days.

origin, now based in Bombay – pushed the

year. ‘In Kenya, we were 22 artists, 11 overseas and 11 local artists working

This performance recalls the anecdote of an

genre of performance art to its extreme.

together for two weeks. It was a remote area with next to no facilities, but it

Indian Buddhist monk who goes to China but

He walked ceremonially to Lal Chowk, the

was challenging to make work out of nothing. It was not a high-tech space,

does not speak for ten years because he cannot

symbolic centre of Srinagar, synonymous with

the outcome of the workshop was not spectacular, but it had a long-term

understand Chinese.

the voicing of a suppressed public will. There

effect on me. The most important thing was the interaction with other

he drew houses on the road while people

artists. There I only had some brushes and worked with planks of wood,

The semiotics of this gesture suggests that not

walked by, stopped and gathered to watch

paper and food-grains. I remember I worked with beans, used new materials

all communication, even that made with the

him. Such assembly is forbidden under the

for the first time.’

best of intentions, results in fruitful exchange.

emergency regulations and could have resulted

It is more likely to result in aporia. Is Song

in a crackdown by the armed forces. Chopra

This aesthetic of making ‘something out of nothing’ flows like a subterranean

Dong the artist-monk teaching us a lesson

dared a political situation to reveal itself; he

current through all of Parekh’s work. While artists like Manisha Parekh

or two about the art of communication in a

placed himself at risk by making drawings

and Subodh Gupta consciously negotiated the politics of materials with

networked world where everyone is only an

of a ghost town in a public space that skids

reference to cultural specificity, artists like Shilpa Gupta (in the third Khoj

email away – so close yet so far? As an offering

between violence and curfew, the muzzle of

Yog Raj Chitrakar visits Lal Chowk, Srinagar, live performance by artist Nikhil Chopra at Khoj Kasheer in 2007

the soldier’s gun and the cry of the militant.

through the streets.

This performance was a disruption of the very

contending superpowers and their allies in the region. The Cold War discourses, however, began to recede through the

idea of ‘open space’ or the ‘public sphere’, in

Paradoxically, these ephemeral conversations

1980s and were displaced, almost entirely by the mid-1990s,

a conflict-ridden zone where a rumour can kill

that beamed as four views/ performances on

by other themes: the self-confidence of the ASEAN grouping;

as effectively as a stray bullet and all civil space

the TV screen were marked by the stubborn

the gradual conviction among the Japanese ruling elite that

has been militarized. This work allows Chopra

and indelible fault lines of caste, class,

Japan must fashion its own attitudes and policies vis a vis Asia,

to move beyond his ‘Sir Raja’ performances,

religion and gender. This is undoubtedly the

independently of US concerns; the emergence of Singapore

with their resonance of feudal ancestry and

liveliest interface between technology, site and

as a strong, self-consciously regional player and a hub; the rise

their somewhat over-designed glamorous

community in Indian art: Anand created a

of Korea as a commercial power and its self-perception as an

backdrops, into a more compelling practice. It

situation where the ‘film’ was made instantly,

isolated peninsula in need of stronger linkages with the world;

is an excellent example of what I would call

without the presence of a cameraman and

the realization in Australia that a rapprochement with Asian

performance as the art of straying and going

editor; here, the participant was also witness-

realities would be both wiser and more profitable than the

astray – of remaking oneself by deliberately

viewer and user. Not only has she stood the

unrealistic role of a Western satellite in the region. Perhaps

getting lost and drifting into danger.

genre of classical documentary (the top-down

of most importance was the carefully calibrated transition

approach to communication) on its head,

of China from a State-controlled, traditionally Communist

In recent years Khoj, now anchored at the

but she has also pierced a hole through the

economy to a State-guided free-market system and a looming

Khirkee studio,

has conceived significant

specious claims of the televisual media, which

economic and military presence.

residencies around the relationship between

are believed to dole out democracy cheaply

art and science, performance art and sonic

through SMS polls and hard-talking TV shows.

During the same period, from the early 1980s to the mid-

art, as well as a ‘Peers’ residency that has

1990s, the attention of Cold War strategists in the US shifted

enabled students to interact with each other.

to Afghanistan, Germany and Eastern Europe; with the end of

Khoj has attempted to ‘co-produce’ an art

the Cold War, US interests began to focus on West Asia and the

world, melding the inherited template of the

the idea of asia

Triangle Arts Trust with formats that come

oil heartland. Correspondingly, Japan, Australia, Singapore and the ASEAN countries found themselves in a situation of

from actual engagements with the changing

It is important to note that Khoj was the

having to think for themselves – to frame their foreign policy

Indian situation. The most remarkable public

Triangle Arts Trust’s first workshop in Asia. A

in a regional frame and to emphasise soft power, since they

art intervention made in the realm of televisual

drastically summarised political history would

could not be military leaders. China also began to minimize

reality and community networking was that

help us understand the reasons behind the

the motif of military might – except towards Taiwan, which

of Shaina Anand’s ‘Khirkeeyaan’. Anand

burgeoning interest of the West in Asia and

it claims as a breakaway but integral part of itself – and play

produced collaborative conversations and

why Asia became more of a reality to Asia

up the motif of trade and cultural relations. Through all these

performances among friends and strangers

itself from the 1980s onwards.

sweeping changes, India vacillated between diplomacy and

residing in different neighbourhoods of

rashness; despite its leadership of the Non-Aligned Movement

Khirkee village, through an open-circuit TV

Until the early 1980s, Asia was primarily a geo-

and its role in creating SAARC (the South Asian Association

system that deployed TV sets, cheap CCTV

political construct based on the diplomatic,

for Regional Cooperation) it remained relatively isolated,

equipment and several meters of cable snaking

military and commercial interests of the

aloof from other Asian coalitions such as ASEAN, seemingly

not fully conversant with the global transformation. In the post-Cold War phase, geo-political realities have been re-drafted

Ulrich Obrist. It contextualized urbanism

and Bombay (2001). Artists from Bangladesh,

and architecture in relation to Asia’s rapidly

Pakistan and Nepal have been invited to Khoj

growing metropolitan centres.

at politically turbulent moments, whether it

and various Asian countries have emerged as actual or potential

was the Royal Palace massacre in Nepal, the

power-houses for the global economy. Importantly, Asia has became

Indian artists such as Nalini Malani took part

failed Indo-Pak summits, or the attack on the

more of a reality to Asia – whether at summit-level governmental

in the second APT and Sheela Gowda, Bhupen

Indian Parliament.

meetings, trade conferences, media gatherings or art biennales, it

Khakhar, Ravinder Reddy, NN Rimzon and

has rapidly become clear that there are threads of opportunity that

Arpita Singh as well as Malani participated in

By contrast, Sood laments the paltry exchange

bind Bombay and Shanghai, Kuala Lumpur and Beijing, Tokyo

Traditions/Tensions. But it would be some time

of art at an official level between India and

and Manila, New Delhi and Jakarta. It is through such moments

before Indian artists could form connections

other Asian countries. She writes: ‘Of all

of encounter and discussion that a new sense of Asia has begun to

with Asian artists, especially their immediate

the exhibitions sent abroad by the National

emerge. While it is true this new Asia might have come to birth in the

neighbours, with whom they shared an

Gallery of Modern Art (the nodal agency

minds of strategic planners and market consultants, it has certainly

uneasy political relationship. To remedy this

that mediates visual art exchange in India)

opened up conceptual and operational space for cultural synergy. This

situation Sood, despite being involved with the

from 1995 to 2001, one went to Dhaka for the

is crucial in an age when artists are able to travel more frequently,

organisation of Khoj’s first workshop, curated

Festival of India in Bangladesh and one went to

compare notes more quickly over the Internet and collaborate more

a series of exhibitions – Mappings: Shared

Beijing. Three more to other Asian countries.

freely across the barriers of nation and region.16

Histories... A fragile Self – to commemorate 50

If we consider the incoming exhibitions from

years of independence for India and Pakistan.

1989, of the 76 incoming exhibitions, again

As for India, it paid dearly for turning its back on Asia. For many of

A year after Mappings, India conducted nuclear

only one each from Bangladesh and China,

India’s cultural actors, with some notable exceptions like Tagore and

tests in Pokhran and in 1999 Pakistan’s

and 5 from Korea and Japan – again fuelled by

Coomaraswamy, the idea of the international has meant a fixation on

incursion into Kargil worsened the already

the active interest of the Japan Foundation. So

the West, particularly Western Europe and North America. Similarly,

strained ties between the two countries. In the

in a 12-year period, art received at the official

for many Indian artists, international art is virtually synonymous with

same year, Shilpa Gupta met Huma Mulji at

level from Asian countries is less than 10%! ... I

Euro-American art, or with taste legislated from Euro-American

Khoj Delhi. Together, they organised Aar Paar,

am convinced that similar statistics exist for Sri

centres like New York and London. According to some observers, Asia

a public art project with artists from Bombay

Lanka, Pakistan and Bangladesh.’18

became a point of conversation in the Indian art world only in 1993,

and Karachi. Even when political blockades

with the inaugural show of the Asia Pacific Triennale. APT produced

prevented artists from travelling between the

Reacting against this bureaucratic apathy,

a new regionality within which to map art practices in the Asian

two countries, their works crossed the borders

Khoj facilitated the initiation of workshops in

context. By the time Khoj was born in 1997, the Gwangju Biennale had

of contention.

the Asian region: Vasl in Pakistan and Teertha

already been inaugurated (1996) and the landmark show Traditions/

in Sri Lanka, both in 2001, and Britto in

Tensions: Contemporary Art in Asia, curated by Apinan Poshyananda, had

With the political situation between India

Bangladesh, in 2003. Thus, Khoj has proved

been held at the Asia Society in New York (also 1996). In the same

and Pakistan at its nadir, Khoj organised

that a lateral internationalism, which connects

year as Khoj, the path-breaking travelling exhibition Cities on the Move

Manoeuvring Miniatures, a show of Pakistani

us horizontally with countries in Asia, is both

began its journey across the planet; curated by Hou Hanru and Hans

artists curated by Virginia Whiles, in Delhi

possible and sustainable – as against some of

of the workshop, writes in the Khoj 1997 catalogue on

the older, top-down and West-centric models

of the major systemic flaws of the Indian

of internationalism that continue to dominate

art world – namely, the mediocre quality of

the imagination of many Indian cultural

art criticism and the banality and laziness of

practitioners.

much art-historical activity – cannot be wished

cultured future based on cooperation, exchange and an

away by pitching spectacle against spectacle,

appreciation of all that is unique to each society.’

the importance of such initiatives: ‘... so that instead of remaining isolated from the world, we contribute positively towards a common yet heterogeneous

the fruits of disruption

bafflement against novelty.

Organisations are like organisms: they have

In my own experience as critic-in-residence at

a life cycle, they must periodically replenish

Khoj Bombay, I realised that the critic’s role

and rejuvenate themselves. One of Khoj’s

was – either by unquestioned custom or the

invited ten artists each from Britain, Canada, and

objectives is to ‘synergise’ practices belonging

dogma of the ‘artist-run occasion’ – restricted

America. The workshop was supposed to be a one-

to different regions. But perhaps the operative

to the facilitation of artists’ presentations.

time event, but it was so successful that Caro continued

term, after a decade of activities, could be

I close this essay on an autobiographical note:

to run the workshop for a decade. In 1985, another

‘self-disruption’. When Khoj began in the

with the proposal that, if ours is to be a healthy

1ate 1990s, it disrupted artists’ chronic gallery

art world, expressive activity must proceed in

reflexes by pushing them out of the white cube.

dialogue with discursive activity and not with

Today, as galleries endorse ephemeral art (in

antagonism towards it. As Khoj advances into

turbulent Apartheid years. Over a 25-year period, the

whatever limited capacity) and auction houses

an array of possible futures, it must recognise

Triangle model has been replicated in other places,

have begun to sell photographs recording stills

that the work of the critic is a related but

from Cape Town, South Africa, through Kunming,

from performance pieces, the question that

independent project of research and inquiry;

China, to a fishing village in Martinique. Since 2003,

needs to be urgently asked is: ‘What, indeed, is

that the critic is the artist’s fellow contributor

the Khojness of Khoj?’

and collaborator in the production of culture.

2. Triangle Arts Trust brought artists out of their studio-enforced isolation and provided the space to share ideas and art practices in an intense two-week workshop. It earned the name ‘Triangle’ because Caro

workshop was facilitated by Triangle Arts Trust in Thupelo, Johannesburg, on the initiative of South African artists. The workshops brought together artists from different parts of the African region during the

the Triangle Arts Association has offered six-month and one-year residencies. 3. Pooja Sood in telephonic conversation with the author (November 2007). Sood recalls how she attended

To my mind, this disruptive energy will have to be re-generated, if we do not want Khoj to be reduced merely to an institution with the best calendar of events or the most efficient cultural network in the Asian region. The heavy traffic on the itinerary must be interrupted,

End Notes:

the Arts Management Workshop in Salzburg where she presented the activities of Khoj. In Salzburg, she learnt

1. The first Khoj working group included Ajay

about networking and confidence-building measures

Desai, Anita Dube, Bharti Kher, Prithpal Singh

and the importance of finding the right people to

Ladi, Manisha Parekh, Subodh Gupta, and Pooja

collaborate with, in different regions.

Sood, who was then the director of the Eicher

interjected with dialogue and discourse.

Gallery, Delhi. The workshop took place in

4. For this reason, I would exclude from my present

I would suggest that, perhaps, Khoj must

Modinagar, an industrial township north of Delhi.

purview such groupings as the Calcutta Group

disrupt its own self-perpetuating logic to gain

In the course of a fortnight, 22 artists from countries

(Calcutta, mid-1940s), the Silpi Chakra Delhi (Delhi,

a renewed measure of effectiveness. Perhaps it

as diverse as Namibia, Sri Lanka, South Africa,

late 1940s and early 1950s), the Progressive Artists

Cuba and Australia, as well as artists from all over

Group (Bombay, late 1940s and early 1950s), and

India, worked together. Ajay Desai, the coordinator

Astitva (Bombay, 1970s). These groupings either

must examine new fields of renovation. One

addressed themselves to the ideal of artistic autonomy in

artistic search...(and) avoid the inevitable petrification (sic)

opposition to the weave of the larger cultural situation, or

of life and art under capitalist competition and the exercise

conducted their discussions of cultural practice in private.

of individual ambitions.’

5. See J Krishnamurti, You are the World (New York: Harper

12. For a critique of SAHMAT, see Arindam Dutta,

& Row, 1972).

‘SAHMAT, 1989-2004: Liberal Art Practice against the Liberalised Public Sphere’ in Cultural Dynamics Vol. 17 No. 2

6. See the ‘Group 1890 Manifesto’ in Lalit Kala Contemporary

(London, Thousand Oaks CA, and New Delhi: Sage, 2005).

40: Special Issue on J. Swaminathan (New Delhi: Lalit Kala Akademi, March 1995).

13. See Nancy Adajania, ‘From One Crisis to the Next: The Fate of Political Art in India’, in Monica Narula et al

7. Vivan Sundaram in telephonic conversation and email

eds., Sarai Reader 4: ‘Crisis/ Media’ (New Delhi: Sarai/CSDS,

exchange with the writer (November 2007).

2004).

8. These remarks were made by Vivan Sundaram, in

14. Anita Dube, ‘Khoj: The Search Within’, exhibition

telephonic conversation with the writer (November 2007).

catalogue

I am indebted to Sundaram for this account of the first

Workshop, 1997).

(New

Delhi:

Khoj

International

Artists’

Triennale-India and the resistance mounted by artists against it.

15. Manisha Parekh in telephonic conversation with the writer (November 2007).

9. The first Kasauli art workshop hosted Gieve Patel, Arpita and Paramjit Singh, Manu and Madhvi

16. See Nancy Adajania, ‘Shifting Routes, Floating

Parekh, Nalini Malani and Srilekha Sikander. Later,

Continents’ in Wonil Rhee (ed.), The Thermocline of Art

Gulammohammed Sheikh, Bhupen Khakhar, Sudhir

(Karlsruhe: ZKM, 2007).

Patwardhan, A Ramachandran, Nagji Patel, Mrinalini Mukherjee, Prithpal Singh Ladi, NN Rimzon, Valsan

17. See Pooja Sood (ed.), Mappings: Shared Histories... A Fragile

Kolleri and many others visited Kasauli. Before Kasauli,

Self (New Delhi: Eicher Gallery, 1998).

the Kashmiri artist GR Santosh (who had studied under Bendre in Baroda and had become a leading exponent of the neo-Tantric style) was the only artist to organise annual art camps, every summer in Kashmir.

18. See Pooja Sood, Pooja, ‘Towards Building a South Asian Network for the Arts’ in Mapping Art SouthAsia: A Visual and Cultural Dialogue between Britain and South Asia (Shisha, Manchester, 2006).

10. Vivan Sundaram in telephonic conversation and email exchange with the writer (November 2007). 11. One of the most significant outcomes of the debates that took place in the Indian Radical Painters and Sculptors Association was the exhibition, Questions and Dialogue (1987). In the catalogue essay, Anita Dube observes that the Radicals wanted to move towards ‘a philosophy of praxis other than that

of an isolated

mapping khoj : idea i place i network pooja sood

khoj as idea

has travelled a distinctive, if sometimes lonely,

seemingly networked art world high on energy,

course.

anxiety and celebration were both fiction.

Offered by Robert Loder, the visionary

Naturally, artists, gallerists and international

founder of the Triangle Arts Trust, the gift

It has been a journey of shifting definitions –

curators racing between Basel and Shanghai

was one of possibility. At a time when Indian

a freedom ‘from’ and responsibility ‘towards’.

were a rareity. In 1997, our encounter with

artists felt isolated and unsupported, Khoj

The route is marked by opportunities lost and

international art was limited to exhibitions

provided young practitioners the possibility of

seized. The path has been charted by those

that cultural arms of foreign embassies or the

an open-ended, experimental space on their

who talked and others who whispered; those

Indian Council for Cultural Relations brought

own terms; a space where they could make art

included and those not; those who revelled in

in. Opportunities to travel abroad came only

independent of formal academic and cultural

the journey and those who left disappointed.

via personal invitations or scholarships offered

institutions and beyond the constraints of

by the likes of the Inlaks Foundation and the

the commercial gallery. It offered the chance

It is impossible for me to fully articulate the

Charles Wallace Trust. Public museums were

to establish international networks. Artist-

complex genesis and cartography of Khoj;

apathetic. The few commercial galleries that

led, it was an initiative for artists by artists. It

inevitably, some things will remain unsaid.

existed were extremely conservative. The

provided the liberating potential of creatively intervening in the prevailing status quo.

spotlight was not on India. We were ‘third India in 1997, when Khoj began, was a very

world’, on the periphery.

different place. McDonald’s and Barista cafés The rapidity of change in the ten years

were not part of the urbanscape; high-speed

Within this milieu, Khoj as ‘idea’ was made

since Khoj came into existence has not left it

internet and communication technologies

tangible by a two-week workshop held in

unmarked. With no models to emulate, Khoj,

were yet to radically alter our perceptions

Modinagar, on the outskirts of New Delhi.

as an ‘alternative’ in contemporary art practice,

of work and play; plush galleries and a

That gathering in 1997 of 24 mid-career

artists – half local, half international –

the workshop

resulted in a dynamic explosion of energies; here was a crucible that catalysed and

Over the next four years artists from across the

configured new imaginings. Working together,

world participated in our annual workshop in

drinking, dancing and debating, the workshop

Modinagar. Invitations went out to artists from

encouraged

stimulated

the Triangle’s vast networks in Africa, Cuba

conversations, threw up discomforts and

and Europe. Back then, the term ‘periphery’

differences but forged contacts that extended

– and ‘other’ – had a different resonance.

well beyond the limits of time and place.

Hungry for direct contact and keen to develop

experimentation,

connections with the ‘global South’, we mined Anita Dube, a founding member, wrote in the

our neighbourhood of South and Southeast

first Khoj catalogue in 1997:

Asia, drawing in artists from mainland China, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Indonesia,

Our aim was to function as an experimental

Singapore and Japan, extending the Triangle

art laboratory that would bring artists together

family in mutual reciprocity.

from different parts of the country, from the subcontinent and from around the globe,

From the start, we wished our direction to be

setting up a cooperative, non-hierarchical

the empowerment of so-called ‘third world’

work situation where dialogue, exchange and

artists. ‘The third world,’ wrote the Cuban

transfer of information, energy and skills could

art critic Gerardo Mosquera, ‘seems to lack

take place as an intensely lived experience.

the capacity to legitimate artistically : this

Khoj is an emblem of our vision of working

arises from a deficit of logistics, but also from

together in difficult situations, somehow

a lack of “assertiveness”, of initiative from

pushing under the establishment’s grain the

“inside towards the outside”, and from not

rubric of creating sensitising encounters,

strengthening enough its own epistemes. The

opening up insularities and closures to address

absence of South-to-South prestige is not

the binary polarisations that have hardened

surprising since the art that circulates South-

into unchangeable positions both inside and

South is insignificant.’2 We conceptualised and

outside.

structured our workshops to initiate processes ‘from the inside towards the outside’.

This was the closest Khoj ever came to writing a manifesto for itself.

The workshops did more. Fuji Hiroshi spent a week cleaning a sewer to enable goldfish to live.

Tania Bruguera, Cuba, at Khoj workshop

Simon Callery used shifting sunlight to create

in Modinagar in 2001

an imagined painting on a boundary wall.

Michael Shaonawasai cross-dressed at a local beauty parlour, Sheba Chhachhi excavated the personal stories of abandoned mill workers in Modinagar and Tania Bruguera collected the workshop’s used teabags, imbuing them with memory and history. Peter Isuge made sculptures of trash; Anita Dube’s use of human bones became a crisis of belief for Australian indigenous artist Fiona Foley and David Koloane’s paintings belied his history of living through Apartheid. In all these ways, much more than art and ideology was shared. Stereotypes were challenged and cultural differences prised open. Knowledge was created in a manner that was subtle and striking. Process-driven, the workshops pushed for a radical re-thinking of the current trajectories of knowledge production, countering the tendency to privilege theory over practice. They created an alternative learning space outside of

formal educational

institutions (with their hierarchics of teachers and students) and built a powerful repertoire of ideas and practices through the often frictive juxtapositioning of individuals from diverse contexts. As entrenched values jostled and challenged one another, new perspectives and positions emerged.3 For two frenetic weeks year after year, Khoj was simultaneously ‘part laboratory, part academy and part community centre,’ with the artist squarely centre stage as practitioner, curator, critic and friend.4 By the end of 2001, Khoj held five successful workshops A work by Imran

in Delhi – the annual pilgrimage to Modinagar mutated

Querishi featured at

to an increasingly lively contemporary art scene. Now,

Khoj workshop held in

there was a feeling they had run their course. Something

Modinagar in 2001.

new was needed. Khoj, as idea, had to move.

the itinerant workshop

The first ‘itinerant’ workshop was held in 2002 in Mysore – the acclaimed cultural capital of south India. Moving across the invisible north-south divide

Khoj was a gift, and gifts open doors to our own

that characterises social mindsets in India was a valuable de-centring process.

possibilities of generosity.

Aware of the challenges of introducing site-specific contemporary art practice,

the working group managed to combine the strengths of Mysore’s existing visual While we struggled in Delhi with our own

arts organisations with the participating artists’ projects. The attendance of more

institutional logic, morphing into a temporary, office-based structure, we offered the workshop to colleagues in different parts of India. This was more than mere relocation or repetition. It was based on a desire to create a new set of relationships, spin-offs, to support autonomous groups of artists working at sites that held local meaning; a vision of what Khoj, as ‘idea’, could mean for different artists.

than a thousand people on the Open Day vindicated the enterprise: Khoj Mysore had the flavour of a mini-festival and the whole city seemed alive to the possibility of contemporary art. 1. Tooraj Khamenehzaden from Iran highlighted

The contained energy of a workshop held in relative seclusion was traded for

his work at Khoj Kasheer held in Srinagar,

an intense encounter with the city the following year, when the workshop moved

Kashmir, in 2007. This was the first International

into the hands of an extended working group and was held at the Government

art project to be held in Kashmir since 1947

Museum in the then-emergent metropolis of Bengaluru. Khoj Mumbai, held

2. An installation by Betsabee Romero

in the vast grounds of the Jindal steel factory on the outskirts of Mumbai,

from Mexico at Khoj’s workshop in

followed in 2005; Khoj Kolkata, in 2006. The site for the latter was a stately,

Bengaluru in 2003

though dilapidated, colonial estate called Chaudhari Bari, used as a de facto film studio, on the city’s southern fringes. Then, in 2007, as the sound of gunfire

dulled for a few hopeful months in Kashmir,

reflection: loss and pain, death and inevitable

provide opportunities for a wide number of artists to participate

we were able to organise Khoj Kasheer at

mortality. Pius offered as ‘art’ a moment of

in residencies and workshops – in India but also, via the Triangle

an old but gracious house nestling among

reflection on what art could be.

network, internationally and, more importantly, within the region.

chinar trees in Lalmandi, Srinagar. It was

As art historian Kavita Singh has remarked: ‘Outside the market,

the first international art project to be held in

The workshops have clearly impacted upon

beyond and before it, Khoj and other artists’ networks set up in

Kashmir since 1947. The practices developed

individual art practices, evidenced by work

the past ten years in India have been a crucially important part of

at these workshops were varied, allowing for an

before and after, and have nurtured growing

the experience of globalisation in Indian art.’Looking back, these

expansive understanding of art. While several

audiences for contemporary art. Their longer-

workshops were perhaps the embryonic beginnings of a network

artworks were embedded in or excavated

term ramifications for the Indian art scene are

of artist-run spaces in India: spaces with similar values and beliefs

from a site as physical and social construct, a

perhaps less obvious.

which, over time, could develop different operating models and

number of projects unpacked the definition

approaches to presenting practice.

of the performative. These ranged from the

The Khoj workshops have brought a disparate

theatrical performance of Michel Tuffery,

group of artists together and, in doing so,

from New Zealand, replete with bull mask,

helped to create a collective organising device

fire and drums beating to the singularly poetic

among usually individualistic and competitive

Even as the workshops took to the road, Khoj in Delhi morphed

rendering of multilingual text by the South

artists. By foregrounding the artist and his art

from being a fluid annual entity into one situated in brick and

African Tracey Rose; from the politically-

as a basis for mutual respect and collaboration,

mortar.

charged painted action of Nikhil Chopra in

the hegemony of one school over others has

the midst of Srinagar’s bustling Lal Chowk,

been neutralised. Khoj legitimised a variety

In 2002, Robert Loder helped us acquire a studio building in Khirkee

conducted in full view of gun-toting soldiers,

of practices hitherto viewed with suspicion by

village, Delhi. An anomaly to the rural as well as the urban, Khirkee

to Simon Gush’s absurdly futile gesture where

artists, so throwing up difficult questions about

lies in the middle of posh South Delhi. Once sprawling agricultural

12 cycle-rickshaw pullers strained against iron

the prosaic and conservative teaching methods

land, it is now a bustling and chaotic habitation of narrow unpaved

chains to heave the Chaudhari Bari out of its

of local art colleges. In its concerted effort to

lanes, where three-storied residential apartments squash up

colonial slumber.

invite artists from smaller cities within India,

against chai and samosa stalls, a barber’s shop, local internet cafés,

it helped to connect often isolated artistic

photography and design studios, stray dogs, domesticated buffaloes,

But it was perhaps a project in Bengaluru,

communities. It brought an understanding

discarded trash, a horse stable, a 13th-century mosque and a newly

by visiting artist Sigit Pius, that provided a

of the international to the local: to artists and

constructed Sai Baba temple. Shimmering across the road from the

paradigm shift for the artistic community.

audiences miles away from access to such art

village, and in surreal contrast to it, are a series of gargantuan glass

Via auto-rickshaw, he invited audiences to an

first hand. It gave an insight into the cultural

and steel malls built in the past two years. Khirkee is a microcosm

obscure and beautiful graveyard, a retreat he

practices of the global South just as the global

of the multiple and stark dichotomies that constitute India’s rapidly

had discovered through his friendship with a

South exploded as a compelling entity into the

globalising cities.

local rickshaw driver. As one wandered among

mainstream.

the dead there was a perceptible stilling of

khoj as place

In the heart of this ‘urban village’, we discovered a charming two-

energy, the agitation of traversing a hectic

Unmediated

institutional

storeyed building, purpose-built as an architect’s office, where six

metropolis giving way to moments of deep

frameworks in India, Khoj went on to

well-ventilated rooms overlooked two internal courtyards. These

existing

Michael Lin, Taiwan, Khoj workshop, Modinagar, 1999

Tapfuma Gutsa from Zimbabwe presented her work at Khoj’s annual workshop in Modinagar in 2000

became five studios and an office-cum-library,

in fairly secluded and, in a sense, protected

collaboration with an environmental activist, a

the studios doubling up as exhibition spaces

environments; together with their shorter

public art project in a university complex.

when required. Much like the architecture

time frame of two weeks, these generate

of older Indian homes, where the internal

intense, catalytic experiences. The slower-

Regular

decision-

arbitrary catalogues and DVDs left behind

enclosure is a community space, these

paced residencies, which generally last six to

making, brainstorming, arguing, fierce debates

by visiting artists to a reasonable collection of

courtyards host many packed openings, as

eight weeks, are limited to a smaller number

about which artists to invite, what next to focus

books and catalogues from across the country

artists and audiences lounge over chilled beer,

of participants – six at most – and allow for

on, made for an exciting moment. Even as we

and South Asia, collected with deliberation.

borrowed cigarettes and hot momos.

a sharper interrogation of the city, as well as

struggled with the administrative aspects of the

The web became an exciting new space to

a more intimate and meaningful exchange

studios, we became ambitious for the space:

inhabit and, despite a few false starts, we

between artists and their work processes.

our programme began to include exhibitions

explored the possibilities of web 2.0, aspiring

by younger artists, a summer residency for

to develop a growing archive. There was never

Since 2002, Khoj Studios has seen a spate of residencies. While both workshops and

from across the world who dropped in. Our resource centre developed from a few

meetings,

consensual

residencies are process- and exchange-driven,

As the programme developed, we began to

new graduates from art colleges across the

a shortage of ideas, but we desperately lacked

the intention and outcomes are slightly

use a media-based focus to curate residencies:

country (the Peers programme) and informal

humanpower. With many members who had

different. With 20-24 artists, workshops occur

ceramics,

presentations by interesting ‘friends of friends’

given time generously over the years, there

photography,

foray

into

was a sense of fatigue in the working group.

increasingly supportive of ‘experimental’ art

Given our ignorance of the trajectory that artist-run spaces often take,

Individual careers were flourishing, the art

practices. The very need for Khoj as an idea

was the anti-institutional rhetoric being confused with the growing size

market became more active and opportunities

and a place was questioned.

of the organisation, its ability to attract funding and the administrative

to travel and exhibit abroad became plentiful;

infrastructure required for efficient functioning? Was it fair to conflate

meetings began to be thinly attended. Working

This was a crucial moment for Khoj: a signpost

these with the assumption that Khoj’s critical or radical capability was

group members who also managed a residency

for introspection, it threw up several questions

now neutralised?

found it exhausting and a distraction to their

that needed serious examining.

own projects; it was agreed that a residency

There were concerns that despite its ‘alternative’ positioning, Khoj was

co-ordinator, who would assist the artists, was

What, for instance, did it mean to become

becoming another voice of authority and arbitrator of quality; that it

necessary.

‘institutionalised’ in the Indian context?

was being co-opted by the mainstream. As Fischer once again points out, ‘The partisan interests of a group of artists engaged in issues based

Now building-based, we were ambitious

We saw ourselves as free and dynamic, a

on their own work interests tend to become identical with the functions

for the organisation but short on staff; we

catalytic space for the incubation of new ideas,

of the so-called establishment: to select, to judge and to create value,

were overworked and underpaid; the board

a place in which to ask questions that were

hierarchy and meaning.’7 In the Indian context, where the so-called art

in its voluntary avatar had rights without

somehow in ‘advance’ of mainstream practice.

‘establishment’ consisted of an apathetic and uninformed public sector

responsibilities; the residencies suffered from

In the absence of a developed discourse on

and the market (with a handful of art critics) as the only arbitrators of

lack of attention. We were a classic case of a

artist-run initiatives in India, we looked for

value, was it indeed wrong to have become distinct and autonomous?

small, organic structure, once built on goodwill

parallels in countries such as Canada and

and common concerns, now overstretched and

Australia, where such centres have a long

More importantly, in a rapidly globalising art world, was Khoj becoming

ill-equipped for inevitable change. We urgently

history. As the Canadian curator Barbara

irrelevant? Were we flogging a dead horse? It was true that commercial

needed a new model of governance.

Fischer has written: ‘Artists who initiated

galleries, encouraged by the burgeoning international art market, were

centres in the late 1960s and 1970s in Canada

stepping in to support hitherto ‘experimental’ art practices. It was also

were concerned with the very lack of an

true that artists were flying across the globe to the multiplying biennales

“institutionalised” art environment, with the

and art fairs, and that the need for ‘international exchange’ per se was

Khoj was in transition, and transitions

lack of both private and institutional curatorial

less pertinent than it had been earlier. However, did this necessarily dilute

are difficult. In early 2005, a challenging

and critical support for contemporary art, and

the need for a space for experimentation and interrogation? Given that

residency project became the peg for a flurry

for the social, aesthetic and political interests

the production and discourse of art was dizzyingly skewed in favour of

of resignations and allegations. Khoj was

of artists living and working in Canada.’6

the market, perhaps the need was precisely for several more such spaces.

transitions

Khoj urgently needed to ask different questions and to look far more

accused of becoming ‘institutionalised’; it was succumbing to the diktats of funders and losing

Khoj too had created space for experimental

sharply for practices in the interstices and the shadows, with less focus on

its edge as an artist-run space. A space posited

art practices, and was neither supported nor

those that had already entered the ‘attention economy’.

as ‘alternative’ to the hierarchical power

acknowledged by public or private institutional

structures of the art world was becoming

models in the country (themselves poorly

To understand the limitations and possibilities of artist-run spaces, it

one itself. Moreover, in the rapidly escalating

funded and hardly in existence). It was

seemed crucial to renegotiate the philosophical and practical meanings

art market, commercial galleries seemed

premised on trying to fill an institutional void.

of the term ‘practice’.

In its ten-year history, several artists who were engaged with

Work by Meher Javed,

Khoj had moved on – in body, if not in spirit. It seemed

Pakistan, at Khoj Live 08,

only a matter of time before an artist who became a curator

Delhi, 2008. Khoj Live

or administrator felt the need to get back to his or her own ‘art’ practice. For the most part, artists have been unable to see the ‘practice’ of running, curating and administering the

08 was a six-day event which had artists from Asia, Europe and Africa participating in it

activities of artist-run centres as a valid form of art practice. So: was it possible to merge an art practice with a curatorial practice, or did they have to remain separate? Could both not be seen as creative practices with ‘artistic’ outcomes, or did we need to delineate them due to the different decision-making and administrative processes required, especially in relation to issues of accountability?8 Could this lack of a sophisticated understanding of ‘practice’ and its possible dimensions be the limitation hindering artist-run spaces in India? It was a moment of personal redefinition, for me as well. I was the single, continuous paid person in Khoj from 2000. Working on all fronts – fundraising, reporting to funders, participating in curatorial choices, planning and supporting workshops in other cities, researching and developing the South Asian network – my contribution remained in the inexplicably ambiguous and often overlapping zones of art manager, curator, institutionbuilder. As a curator working with a space on a long-term basis, one has the opportunity to shape the greater context of that space. If context is the chief tool of a curator, whether a specific exhibition or grouping of artists, or the larger context of an organisation’s history or mandate, can one begin to look at this work as curation, in the broadest sense of the term? Can one look at curation – beyond exhibition-making – as a ‘site-specific’ project; an ongoing assignment, without a fixed beginning, middle or end?7 As the architect and theorist Nikolaus Hirsch has suggested, can institution-building itself be understood as curatorial practice?9

khoj as network

Re-envisioning Khoj’s direction, at a time

of “emerging”, tagging it to the “art” rather

when the spotlight was on the ‘edifying’ rubric

than the “artist”… In this way, artists’

of the art market, international exhibitions

organisations become spaces of “emerging

If a network can be loosely defined as a social structure made of

and giddy auction prices, was a challenge. We

art” where the art must always be emerging

individuals (or organisations) connected by one or more specific types

began to examine a range of artistic practices

in the sense that it needs to be speculative,

of interdependency – in this case, friendship and relationships of

that were temporal, research-based and

transient and open to change.’ This is not,

difference, belief and knowledge – the Khoj workshops and residencies

collaborative; projects that employed radical

however, to negate the necessity of supporting

have helped practitioners in India forge such networks with artists from

new digital technologies as well as older,

emerging artists who need spaces to work and

across India and the world.11 Ironically, however, it has been across our

more activist, modes of engagement with

exhibit their ideas.

most obdurate borders within the subcontinent that Khoj has made its

most radical contribution.

communities. These approaches were situated outside the supportive structures of the gallery

That Khoj has supported both the emerging

and within the extended idea of the public

‘artist’ and emerging ‘art’ was made manifest

The past few years have seen an explosion in the exposure of Asian art

realm. In short, the focus on the market and

in its ten-year celebrations held in 2008. These

across the wider world. The profusion of Asian biennales and triennials

exhibition-export was eclipsing the socially

foregrounded the Peers programme with the

during the past five years has resulted in diverse and cacophonic

engaged and post-medium art practices being

exhibition Filament, as well as performance

definitions, redefinitions, interpretations, reinterpretations, imaginings

explored by Indian artists; we decided to

art as an ‘emerging’ practice in India with the

and reimaginings of the very notion of Asia. In 1997 this was not so.

make these our key areas of inquiry. In doing

festival Khoj Live 08.

The circulation of information about artists and practice within Asia was thin. Despite profound historical connections and commonalities,

so, we were also trying to create alternative art worlds – worlds populated by creative

Filament was curated from more than 25

many of us were largely unaware of what existed in our immediate

practitioners whose work failed to fit neatly

artists who had participated in the Khoj Peers

neighbourhood. Our instinct was to establish comparisons between

into existing categories. Thus far, audiences

residency over the preceding six years, revealing

each location and the ‘West’, leaving inter-regional connections largely

for Khoj consisted of visual artists, curators

their professional and artistic trajectories in

unexplored. Asian initiatives such as the Fukuoka Triennial in Japan,

and writers. As we extended our gaze to other

the short term. Khoj Live 08 was a pulsating

Asia-Pacific Triennial (APT) in Australia and Gwangju Biennale in

practices there was a corresponding shift in

six-day event with four to five performances

South Korea had just begun to gain currency, and while they provided a

audiences.

each day by more than 25 artists from across

forum for artists from the South Asian region to come together formally,

Asia, Europe and Africa. With its slippage

circulation within the region was not addressed.

The curatorial shift implied a shift in what

between dance, theatre and the visual arts, it

Khoj stood for. Increasingly, Khoj was

contributed some radical offerings within the

It was only by default that we made our first connections with artists

being pigeonholed as a place that incubated

established Indian context of performance

across our borders. The first Khoj workshop in India in 1997 coincided

emerging artists. We felt it was equally

and the performative.

with a series of exhibitions called Mappings that I curated for a private gallery in Delhi to mark India and Pakistan’s fifty years of independence.

relevant for established artists pushing in exciting new directions: we would equally

In retrospect, can such moments of rupture

It was not an email-friendly era and information did not magically

incubate new ideas. It was important, as Suzie

and departure be seen as positive? Can they

appear at the click of a mouse. Like others, I was convinced that direct

Attiwill of Australia’s RMIT University has

be viewed as significant opportunities for

contact with Pakistan was impossible and was looking, as we were wont

succinctly said, to ‘invert the understanding

introspection, growth and change?

to, for artists of Pakistani origin in the diaspora.

A miniature by Saira

Buoyed by our ‘discoveries’, we exuberantly

In November 2001, in an attempt to give

invited artists to participate in our workshops

coherence to the idea of regional collaboration,

and received matching responses – mirroring,

Khoj along with Triangle organised a modest

miniatures by Pakistani artists

perhaps, the long-felt need to connect.

two-day closed-door gathering of about 25

showcased in Delhi in 2008,

Regional artists who had participated in Khoj

artists, critics and art historians from the

at Khoj’s invitation

or one of the Triangle workshops abroad were

region to discuss the possibility of developing

enthusiastic about initiating similar projects in

a sustained network in South Asia/Asia.

their countries. I was privileged to travel and

Concurrently, we organised the first public

research further and, together with Triangle,

forum on contemporary art practice in

develop a series of workshops in South Asia.

South Asia/Asia in Delhi, entitled ‘Chaos or

Wasim, Pakistan, part of Manouvering Miniatures, an exhibition of contemporary

Congruence?’. In addition, at Khoj’s invitation, In January 2001, the first Vasl international

Virginia Whiles, a British curator teaching

workshop was held in Gadani, in Baluchistan

at the National College of Arts in Lahore,

near Karachi, at a location sandwiched between a

curated Manoeuvring Miniatures, an exhibition

ship-breaking site, a fishing village and the ocean.

of contemporary miniature paintings from

In September that year, Theertha international

Pakistan. Despite drawing on a tradition of

artists’ workshop was held at Lunuganga,

pre-modern painting Indians consider their

the sprawling estate of the famous architect

own, it was the first time these images were

Geoffery Bawa, near Colombo in Sri Lanka.

displayed in India. ‘An emblematic event… in

In early 2003, Britto held its first workshop at

its utter familiarity and profound strangeness,

Tepantor, a site near Dhaka frequently sought

contemporary Pakistani art came to the Indian

out by the Bangladeshi film industry. Then in

art scene as both trauma and catharsis.’12

2004 Sutra held its international workshop in Patan, near Kathmandu in Nepal. Funding

The year 2001 was a dark one for the

However, a chance discussion with a participating artist, Nalini Malani, who

for each workshop was raised locally, with

subcontinent. Inevitably, the aftermath of 9/11

had worked with the Karachi-based artist Iftikhar Dadi in Copenhagen,

Triangle supporting the travel of some of the

radically altered the region’s fault lines. But

led me to pick up the phone and invite him to take part in the exhibition

international participants. While artists from

with the Royal Palace massacre in Nepal and

and, by extension, in the Khoj workshop. Thereafter, in what even now

Egypt, China, the UK, Singapore, Myanmar,

the ensuing Maoist politics there, the increased

feels like an incredible series of connections, we were introduced to artists

Thailand, the Netherlands and Nigeria

Indo-Pak tensions bordering on war after the

from Sri Lanka by Suhanya Raffel of APT in Australia; practitioners in

attended these workshops, the core invitees in

failed Agra Summit, and the intensified civil

Nepal by Raiji Kuroda of the Fukuoka Asian Arts Museum, Japan; artists

each case were from the Indian subcontinent.

war in Sri Lanka in which half of the country’s

in Bangladesh via curators of the UK’s Shisha; practitioners in Bhutan

While the workshops forged alliances between

aircraft were destroyed by LTTE suicide

by Sebastian Lopez of the Gate Foundation in the Netherlands; artists

local and international artists, they also

bombers, it was a particularly volatile moment.

in Tibet via Clare Harris from the UK and practitioners in Myanmar by

empowered local artists to address local issues

Against this backdrop of political violence and

artists of Singaporean origin based in Cologne, Germany!

in new, distinctive ways.

instability, our nascent artistic partnerships

offered precious reassurance of community, of

organised an exhibition of Sinhalese art in

spawning invitations to practitioners to collaborate, curate and teach in

our existence as sub-continental practitioners

Jaffna, the former stronghold of the LTTE,

one another’s countries, including the mounting of a major exhibition of

committed to liberal and democratic cultural

and has consistently built deeper connections

Pakistani art at the National Gallery of Modern Art, Mumbai, in 2005:

values.

with artists from south India. Britto has created

Beyond Borders.

a node in the harbour city of Chittagong and Funding is a serious concern for any artists’

has developed lively links with artists in the

organisation. Since government funding in the

isolated and contested hill tracts of Bangladesh.

subcontinent is next to non-existent, sizeable

When such ripples intersect, they create eddies of deep significance. One such occasion was the exhibition Six Degrees of Separation: Chaos,

corporate sponsorship is still to come of age

The problem of the workshops being held

Congruence and Collaboration in South Asia, held in September 2008. Five

and private donations from friends and family

annually or sometimes even once in two

editions of the exhibition opened simultaneously in Karachi, Colombo,

are at best limited, most groups have to rely

years, limiting the exchange of artists in the

Kathmandu, Dhaka and Delhi. Curated by Vasl, Theertha, Sutra, Britto

on international donors, the majority of which

region, was overcome with the institution of

and Khoj respectively. They displayed more than 45 projects conceived and

fund only registered societies. In Bangladesh,

the residencies, which were more frequent

produced by South Asian artists from neighbouring countries in the many

getting registered as a non-governmental

and allowed for a wider circulation of artists.

regional residencies and workshops that had taken place since 2001. Faisal

organisation to enable the reciept of funds

Keeping the network open and alive, and

Anwar, an artist of Pakistani origin from Canada, travelled between Karachi,

from abroad can take anything up to five years.

being aware that it could easily be viewed as

Dhaka and Delhi and, using new technology, connected us in cyberspace –

In India, the receipt of foreign funding by an

or, worse still, become an exclusive coterie of

making us acutely aware of that insidious gap between our nations even

NGO is a legal offence unless approval has

self-serving individuals, called for integrity and

as it was momentarily bridged, as well as the tenuous bonds painstakingly

been granted under the Foreign Contribution

collective vigil from all partners.

facilitated over ten years by the South Asian Network of Artists. For while

Regulations Act. Pakistan and Sri Lanka are relatively more fortunate in this regard.

Six Degrees of Separation refers to the notion that everyone on the planet is Mutual respect, trust and the will to share

linked to everyone else by a chain of six people, and connectedness seems

resources are thus the basis for effective

idiomatic of the globalised world, the phrase assumes a somewhat different

The success of the annual workshops and

intercultural work. Our greatest strength today

complexion in South Asia where historically embedded prejudices and

sustained support from Ford Foundation

is, undoubtedly, the pool of artists wilfully

complex socio-political realities have made separation the defining factor.

made it possible to institute temporary

linked to each other. In the face of increased

office-cum-residency spaces in each location,

political volatility post 9/11 and enhanced

However, today, when the largest permanent collection of contemporary

thereby developing the regional network.

securitization across borders, maintaining such

art from South Asia is housed at the Devi Art Foundation in Delhi, when

Simultaneously, each organisation has made a

connections is even more challenging than

exhibitions of Pakistani artists at leading art galleries in India are no longer

serious commitment to support its local artistic

before. Simple procedures, such as obtaining

exceptional, when a South Asian journal of visual culture is edited from

community and connect it globally, creating

visas for visiting artists, are often fraught with

Colombo, when artists regularly criss-cross borders to teach, exhibit, mingle

dynamic websites, archives, newsletters and,

difficulty.

and celebrate – and abiding friendships (even marriages) exist across borders

in some cases, a much-needed contemporary

– we believe that our attempt at connecting the erstwhile ‘zones of silence’

art gallery or international new media festival.

Despite all odds, each group has generated

has reached a tipping point: the point when small things begin to make a

Sensitive to its political imperatives, amongst

significant ripples. The projects between India

big difference.

other initiatives, Theertha in Sri Lanka

and Pakistan have been particularly fruitful,

networks within

Located in geographically different areas, their

into accountability structures. It is a steep

models were equally varied.

learning curve. However, negotiating inner

Khoj has been referred to as an ‘engine of mobility, connectedness, and crossfertilisation’ in the Indian and South Asian art world.

shifts and tensions, Khoj persists in stretching

While it endeavoured

Periferry, started by the artist duo Desire

its limits and taking risks in the domain of

to create an informal network of artists across the globe, and more particularly

Machine Collective, uses an old riverboat

cutting-edge contemporary art practice in

within South Asia, a truly robust network within India took quite a while to

on the banks of the river Brahmaputra in

India. Excited by the potential of an idea, it

materialise. Khoj’s circles of influence have been strangely inverted: the initiative

Guwahati, Assam, as its site. Committed to

continues to make things possible: enabling

began by connecting internationally, then regionally, and was finally left with a

investigating the interstitial spaces between

artistic ideas and initiatives alike. The

more felt need for sustained connections within the local.

art, science, technology and ecology, the name

international workshop, meanwhile, retains

plays, of course, with the nature of being at

credence with artists who believe that it can

The itinerant workshops across India had created invaluable catalytic moments

the periphery (the North east is considered a

energise a local artistic community.

for artists and communities alike; in some places, such as Kolkata, the

militarily and ethnically sensitive border region

workshop transformed into a semi-permanent structure, organising projects in

by the Indian government), a position they see

Khoj Studios remains committed to an intense

an autonomous manner. Over the years Khoj studios had worked with many

as ‘positive and productive, a mediation of

programme, envisioning the potential and the

extraordinary individuals across India. Some were keen to set up alternative

structures beyond centres’.

boundaries of untested practices. A slew of

spaces for a diverse range of practices and looked to Khoj for friendly advice.

opportunities seems to be flying in through

While this was freely shared, the logistical and legal aspects of setting up a space

In contrast, the CAMP initiative, founded

its doors: to nest a curatorial node; to support

often proved to be a deterrent. Seeing exciting ideas lapse for want of support

by the new media artists Shaina Anand and

and develop public art as an initiative; to

compelled a revision in strategy. Could we, for example, use our resources and

Ashok Sukumaran, is situated in the metropolis

grow the research possibilities of its archive

goodwill to foster a vibrant network of experimental spaces across India? An

of Mumbai, a global centre for films, televised

– opportunities exciting in and of themselves,

extended network, as the critic Nina Möntmann has suggested in her essay

media and art which tends, however, to lack

which would no doubt also make a valuable

on new institutionalism, of ‘organised collaborations [that] could serve as an

robust art practices independent of the

contribution to the visual arts discourse in

information pool, a hub for various trans-disciplinary forms of collaboration,

market. 1 Shanthi Road, on the other hand,

India.

in legal matters as a union, and as an entry for audiences to participate locally

is an existing, albeit fledgling, studio-cum-

and exchange internationally’?

Or were we being overly idealistic? Perhaps it

residency space in the centre of Bengaluru.

But what are the implications for Khoj itself as

would be impossible to negotiate the various sizes, programmes, directions and

Run by the artist and writer Suresh Jayaram,

it is compelled in these directions? Through its

ideologies of such spaces – creating more competition or, worse still, unhealthy

a working group member of Khoj Mysore and

flexible and sometimes audacious response to

hierarchies.

Bengaluru, it has a clear affinity with Khoj’s

the demands of the contemporary arts sector,

core values.

is Khoj outgrowing its mandate? Is it, in fact,

In the mode of idealism and risk-taking that characterises Khoj’s praxis, in 2007

setting itself up to implode?

we applied to the Sir Ratan Tata Trust for modest funding to test the possibility

As I write, we are still grappling with the

of developing such a network. We decided to support three distinct projects

challenges involved in these partnerships:

We have no immediate answers. But standing

across the country for three years with the intention of providing back-up long

implications such as the perceived hierarchies

at the threshold of change once again, the

enough for them to test their agendas and acquire the legal affiliations needed for

when funds flow through one organisation to

question of overriding importance for Khoj as

independent growth in the long term.

another, or the hardening of fluid relationships

it aspires to be an institution of excellence is

whether it can simultaneously function as an effective engine of sectoral support.

End Notes

Paradoxically, if the very existence of Khoj as an institution is dependent on a thriving experimental art scene, does it have a choice?

closing thoughts

Charles Esche (eds.), Art and Social Change: A Critical Reader (Tate Publishing, London, 2008).

An avid collector and art lover, Robert Loder

organised the first Triangle workshop in 1982 in New

York together with the artist Anthony Caro. Amazed

Decalog: YYZ 1979-89 (YYZ Publications, Toronto,

by its capacity to generate energy and enthusiasm

1993).

See B Fischer, ‘YYZ: An Anniversary’ in

Viewed from the inside, the making of institutional history and related notions

between artists, he initiated workshops in South

of success seem irrelevant. In writing about what Khoj has (or has not) achieved

Africa. Bringing artists from different backgrounds

in the past ten years, I find my headspace occupied with issues that Khoj is

and regions together during the Apartheid era had

struggling with today: on the one hand, its intrinsic economic fragility and, on

a powerful impact, subsequently inspiring a number

the other, its ambition for the future – its raison d’être, if you will.

of artists to set up similar workshops in Zimbabwe,

exhibitions

Botswana, Mozambique, Senegal, Jamaica, Cuba,

Vancouver, Canada, and Brett Jones, co-founder

Khoj has nurtured and developed itself largely via support received from

Australia, Egypt and, in 1997, India. Some of the

and chair, West Space, Melbourne, Australia.

international institutions. As funding cycles come to an end, we find ourselves

founding members of Khoj had been invited to

(http://www.westspace.org.au/discur sive/

precariously poised. In the absence of generous local patronage, we urgently

attend workshops in Africa; they returned eager

jonathon-middleton-in-conversation-2003.html,

need to rethink our funding model and plan strategies for sustainability. This is

to establish a group based on Triangle’s model.

2003).

Khoj’s main challenge for the future.

Loder’s initiative has become virtually a workshop

Over the years, Khoj as ‘idea’ has evolved into an amphibious creature which

7 Ibid. Conversation between Jonathon Middleton, curator,

Western

Front

Society,

movement, with new initiatives being set up almost

every year in different parts of the world.

Institution Building: Artists, Curators, Architects in the

is at once a physical space and an extended network, curatorially led and artist-

See N. Hirsch, in Nikolaus Hirsch et al.,

Struggle for Institutional Space (Sternberg Press, New

run, an active player and a passionate facilitator. It has challenged ideas of what

can constitute art practice in India. It has acted as a site for both emerging artists

Transcultural Curating’ in Jean Fisher (ed), Global

and ‘emerging art’. It has formed networks, introducing and connecting non-

Visions: Towards a New Internationalism in the Visual

10 Suzie Attiwill, quoted in conversation between

local artists into local communities and vice versa.

Arts (Kala Press in association with Iniva, London,

Jonathon Middleton and Brett Jones (2003), op cit.

See G. Mosquera, ‘Some Problems in

York/Berlin, 2009).

1994).

Of greater valence is the fact that Khoj has anticipated change and worked to

11 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_network

keep pace with it. It has viewed disruption as a challenge and has been persistently

3 As noted by the social scientist Rahul

self-reflexive while walking the tightrope of institutionalism.

Srivastava in a private conversation with the author.

12 See K. Singh, Six Degrees of Separation (Khoj, Delhi, 2009)

But mostly, Khoj has looked ahead: constantly walking, on the move, always

searching

Institutionalism: Perspectives on a Possible Future’

See N. Möntmann, ‘The Rise and Fall of New 13

Ibid.

N. Möntmann (2007), op cit.

(transform.eipcp.net, 2007). 5

See Raqs Media Collective, ‘A Concise Lexicon

of/for the Digital Commons’ in Will Bradley and

TIMELINE 1997

Elections held for the state assembly of Jammu

A 7.6-magnitude earthquake hits Kashmir near

2000

& Kashmir despite efforts by militants to disrupt

the Pakistan-India border, killing thousands

India marks the birth of its billionth citizen,

polling.

of people on either side of the LoC, reducing villages to rubble and triggering landslides.

Astha. 30-year

The Supreme Court of India rejects the petition

2003

water-sharing arrangement and recognising

of Narmada Bachao Aandolan and permits the

Mumbai rocked by a series of bomb attacks

2006

Bangladesh’s rights as a lower-level riparian state,

height of the Sardar Sarovar Dam across the

through the year. Consecutive bombs exploded in

Series of seven bomb blasts take place over a

comes into force.

Narmada River to be raised.

a crowded jewellery market and by the Gateway

period of 11 minutes on the suburban railway,

Irom Sharmila begins a fast unto death to protest

of India in Mumbai, killing 53 people, wounding

in Mumbai, plying the western line; 209 people

1998

the killing of 10 Manipuris by paramilitary

150 others. The Student’s Islamic Movement of

were killed and over 700 were injured.

Bharatiya Janata Party , as part of the National

troops. She demands repeal of the Armed Forces

India is held responsible and banned.

U.S.-India Civil Nuclear Agreement is signed

Democratic Alliance, forms the government at

Special Power Act, 1958 (AFSPA).

In Assam, the Bodoland Territorial Autonomous

during President Bush’s visit to New Delhi.

the Centre.

Three new states come into being – Chhattisgarh,

District was declared.

India tests its nuclear power capability at Pokhran.

Uttaranchal (later renamed Uttarakhand), and

India offers to observe a voluntary moratorium

Jharkhand.

The

1996

treaty,

establishing

2007 2004

Sixty-eight passengers travelling from New Delhi

A activists gather for a 6-day World Social Forum

to Lahore on the Samjauta Express are killed

2001

in Mumbai, meant to be a counterpoint to the

by bomb blasts and a blaze on the train. This

A Massive earthquake of 7.7 magnitude strikes

World Economic Forum at Davos.

incident is linked to Abhinav Bharat, a shadowy

1999

near the town of Bhuj on the morning of

Powerful earthquake off the coast of Indonesia

Hindu fundamentalist group headed by former

Prime Minister AB Vajpayee makes a historic bus

Republic Day.

triggers massive tsunami waves that devastates

Indian army officer Prasad Shrikant Purohit.

trip to Pakistan and signs the Lahore Declaration,

President

coastal communities in southern India.

Pratibha Patil is elected President, becoming the

the first major agreement between the two

Vajpayee meet for a two-day summit in Agra.

Ahmedabad witnesses the staged encounter

country’s first woman president.

countries since the Shimla Accord of 1972.

The summit collapses, with both sides unable to

killing

Indian economy records five continuous years of

After Pakistani forces occupy positions across

reach agreement on the core issue of Kashmir.

operatives by the Police Crime Branch.

nearly 9% annual growth.

the Line of Control at Kargil in Kashmir, India

On December 13, an armed attack on the Indian

begins a campaign to recover its territory. Indian

Parliament in New Delhi leaves 14 people dead.

2005

2008

Airlines Flight 814 is hijacked en route to New

India blames Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-

President George Bush and Prime Minister

Divisive Batla House encounter against suspected

Delhi by members of Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, a

Muhammad for the attacks and masses troops on

Manmohan Singh announce their intention to

Indian Mujahideen terrorists in Jamia Nagar,

Pakistan-based group and flown to Kandahar.

its border with Pakistan.

enter into a nuclear agreement in Washington

Delhi ocurrs.

DC.

On 26 November, Mumbai is held hostage by

on further tests and to engage in negotiations to sign the CTBT.

Musharraf

and

Prime

Minister

The Supreme Court, holding the LTTE alone

four

apparent

Lashkar-e-Toiba

responsible for the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi,

2002

Series of explosions shake New Delhi, tearing

terrorists. More than 160 people are killed in

awards the death sentence to three of the 26

Communal riots in Gujarat, following the

through its markets jammed with shoppers ahead

the attacks. The lone terrorist captured, Ajmal

accused, life imprisonment to four persons and

Godhra incident, lead to widespread destruction

of Diwali, killing 61 people and injuring more

Kasab, after a three-day siege at the Taj, confesses

acquits the rest.

and death.

than 200.

to ties with Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba. In

the wake of the 26/11 attacks, India breaks off

allocation licenses, creates a national uproar.

Widespread communal clashes in the Bodoland Territorial Autonomus Districts in Assam; the

talks with Pakistan. Series of 11 coordinated blasts tear through

2011

Assam, killing at least 77 people and sending

Recurrent incidents of

police scrambling to find any unexploded bombs

fishermen by the Sri Lankan Navy leads to

Fearing a violent backlash and scared by social

in a state troubled by years of separatist violence

tension between the two countries.

networking sites, thousands of migrants from the

and ethnic tension.

Bangladesh and India launch a census of

North-east fled the cities of Bangalore and Pune.

agitators wanted the government to detect and killing of

Indian

deport ‘foreigners’ or Bangladeshi immigrants.

enclaves, areas where one country’s territory 2009 The High Court of

is surrounded by the other, in an effort to end Delhi decriminalises

complex border disputes.

homosexuality, a major victory for the LGBTQ

Binayak Sen is released on bail after languishing

community.

in a Chhattisgarh jail on charges of sedition.

Cyclone Aila lashes low-lying areas in eastern

Anna Hazare starts a hunger strike on 5 April

India and Bangladesh, destroying thousands of

2011 to exert pressure on the Indian government

homes and stranding tens of thousands of people

to enact the Lokpal Bill.

in flooded villages.

The economic blockade on Manipur, declared

Shopian case, where Indian security personnel

by warring tribes of Kukis and Nagas, is lifted

were accused in the alleged abduction, rape

after 121 days.

and murder of two women, leads to widespread

India wins the ICC Cricket World Cup,

unrest in Kashmir.

defeating Sri Lanka in the final.

2010

2012

Kashmir’s summer of discontent: public protests,

India replaces China as the world’s largest arms

killings, shutdowns and curfews once again bring

buyer.

the Valley to a bloody standstill. The unrest began

In the wake of the Fukushima nuclear disaster,

as a reaction to the killing of three Kashmiri

Kudankulam Atomic Power gets delayed due to

civilians, labelled Pakistani ‘infiltrators’ by the

anti-nuclear protests by the local communities

Indian Army for a cash award.

and People’s Movement Against Nuclear

XIX Commonwealth Games were held in

Energy.

New Delhi, amidst charges of corruption and

India overturns its ban on foreign investment

mismanagement.

from Pakistan in a move designed to build

2G spectrum scam, involving government

goodwill, amid a renewed push for a peace

ministers and officials illegally undercharging

settlement

mobile telephony companies for frequency

neighbours.

between

the

nuclear-armed

collective histories : vasl and pakistani art fatima quraishi 71

This article traces the history of Pakistani art

susceptible to the whims of government

from this tradition came during the colonial period, when the Western art canon

from the decades preceding Partition in 1947

and institutional agendas. There is nothing

was imposed unilaterally onto art practice via colonial institutions.

to the present, considering in particular the

new about this phenomenon – art is always

formation of artist collectives. In Pakistan

subject to social norms and values and the

While this imposition had long-standing reverberations in the subcontinent,

various developments in institutional structures

subcontinent, with its rich tradition of art and

a subversion of the British-dictated influences that encroached into art of this

and art infrastructures, along with the wider

culture, has moved through many periods of

region emerged in movements such as the 1930s Bengal School, the participants of

history of the nation, have contributed to the

change. The foundations of Pakistan’s visual

which consciously emphasised their position as Indians, while forging a modernist

existence of groups and collectives within the

culture lie within this long, storied history. The

aesthetic within their work.1 Akbar Naqvi notes that this sensibility was widely

arts. The latter half of this chapter examines

art of this region demonstrates wide variations

shared and in evidence across a wide range of artistic practices during this period:

one such collective, the Vasl Artists’ Collective,

in the relationship artists have with society.

the most prominent and, arguably, the most

While at times, for example, artists have

In the Raj… -art, as a language or a discourse, was that of power as colonial

influential artist collective in the country. By

been vanguards of revolution, throughout

aesthetics. But Abdur Rahman Chughtai, Ustad Allah Bukhsh, and their

plotting the development of Vasl’s activities

this history a great deal of art production

subcontinental contemporaries found both power and freedom under conditions

and its influence in Pakistan, one can begin to

has become heavily dependent upon state

of control. Zubeida Agha and Shakir Ali brought about a profound change under

understand both current and future directions

patronage. Historically, art production in

the hegemony of the West as before, but they also dealt with the same issues of

of the Pakistani art world, along with the role

South Asia has been largely team-oriented,

power and freedom as the Ustad and Chughtai had before them.2

of the artist collective more generally.

where the individual has been subsumed into a collective activity – a circumstance set in

Nascent stirrings of nationalism echoed throughout the Indian academic and

Cultural production in Pakistan, similar to

play by the patronage of royal ateliers in the

creative milieu, setting the stage for the creation of a post-colonial independent

all other aspects of Pakistani life, is unstable,

Mughal courts (1526-1858). The major break

state while rejecting a wholesale appropriation of Western constructs of

modernity, framing it instead in the context of an Indian

emphasis on regional characters or ‘Islamic’

Molka Ahmed – who was educated entirely in

identity. It is unsurprising then, that in the aftermath of

visual icons such as calligraphy.

the West – supervised the Punjab University’s

Partition, artists in the new state of Pakistan proceeded

Fine Arts programme. Female involvement in

on the path of modernism that had been initiated in

Much of the art produced in West Pakistan

the arts was primarily limited to art education,

the subcontinent’s pre-Partition art movements. The

during this period remained within genres of

despite the fact that the Department of Fine

ideologies of modernism, with its implicit promise of

landscape and portraiture, the former allowing

Arts at the Punjab University reserved places for

the future, when combined with the pre-colonial past(s)

for an appealing, romantic and ‘folksy’

women after 1940. Salima Hashmi describes

of the subcontinent, represented for artists in the newly-

image of Pakistan to emerge. In many ways

this as disguised discrimination against both

minted state of Pakistan an exemplary combination of

this provided a form of aesthetic escapism,

women and the arts. She argues this move

tradition and progress.

diverting from difficult issues of self-definition

indulged women – the future homemakers,

within the art of new Pakistan and, by proxy,

mothers, wives, and daughters of Pakistani

In fact, despite a demographic shift within the

Pakistani identity too. In East Pakistan, with

men – in their pursuit of a harmless, non-

subcontinent, most mechanisms and institutions of the

Abedin closely associated with the Progressive

threatening occupation.4

art world in the new Pakistan saw little change. Artists

Artists’ Movement in (then) Calcutta, a

were still attending art academies in Pakistan’s cities

different mode of production was taking place.

– most significantly the Mayo School of Art and the

Abedin’s celebrated Famine series of 1943 was

Department of Fine Arts at the Punjab University (both

an early example of work that emerged from

in Lahore). In East Pakistan in 1949, Zainul Abedin

a community intending to stress the social

established the Institute of Fine Arts in Dhaka, fortifying

role of artists. This sensibility enabled and

the development of an art infrastructure in the eastern

propelled East Pakistani art practice to engage

half of the nation. It is perhaps best to characterise this

with concerns surrounding Bengali culture

early period as one of consolidation, where Pakistani

and identity, in particular what it had become

artists sought to gather themselves into some form of

in the context of the Pakistani state. Despite

cohesive framework, strengthening art institutions,

differences in approach between the two halves

developing their own art practices and emphasising the

of the nation, there were continuous exchanges

need for a solid foundation of the Pakistani art world.

between the two, with artists travelling back

Surprisingly, very few Pakistani artists referenced the

and forth frequently.

Partition itself, seeming to ignore the carnage and trauma of this tremendous movement of populations

The progression of art during this period

across the subcontinent. It appears artists wanted

Abdur Rahman Chughtai (1897-1975)

was not entirely driven by localised concerns,

to obliterate the memory of 1947, seeking instead to

was a painter and intellectual. He

however, and a number of artists travelled

From abstract works by Zubeida Agha to

to Europe to study. A.R. Chughtai studied

landscapes by Allah Bux, the influence of a

printmaking at the Central School of Art in

particularly Western modernism emerging

London, Ali Imam studied, practiced and

in this early period of Pakistan’s history

exhibited in London for ten years and Anna

is undeniable. Often the cross-movement

undergo the project of inserting themselves into the new nation state, often conceptualising the new ‘Pakistan’ by removing any overtly Hindu or non-Muslim icons from their repertoire, while simultaneously placing a greater

created his own unique and distinctive painting style influenced by Mughal art, miniature painting, Art Nouveau and Islamic art traditions

of modernisms between Europe and the

on Pakistani art at this time, the application

subcontinent was the result of artists working

of Western developments in abstraction, for

or studying abroad. Shakir Ali, for example,

example, was influenced by local content

returned to Pakistan from Europe soon after

and local art histories and was thus an

Partition, having travelled to London after

appropriation of the Western canon rather

World War II where he studied at the Slade

than a total adoption of it.

School of Fine Art. While later living in Paris, Ali studied under the Cubist painter André Lhote and in Prague he worked as a commercial textile designer. Upon his return

1. Roots 6, 1984, a part of the series of paintings by

to Pakistan, Ali began teaching at the Mayo

Anwar Jalal Shemza, Indian ink on paper, 29.7 x 21.3cm

School of Art in 1952, eventually becoming

(Courtesy: Artist’s Estate and Green Cardamom)

principal in 1961. The influence of his travels inevitably marked his pedagogical direction. In terms of the influence of Western modernisms

2. Roots, 1977, a painting by Anwar Jalal Shemza, hand-dyed cloth on marbled hardboard, 61 x 44 cm (Courtesy: Artist’s Estate and Green Cardamom)

As has generally been the case across the arts

Ghulam Ahmed Pervaiz, Marium Shah

that inherited the modernist concerns of those

interpretations and contradictory, indeed

historically and regionally, during this period

and Razia Feroze gathered together in what

artists, which in turn influenced the emergence

often fundamentally different, theoretical

art production was limited to a very small

would eventually be called the ‘Lahore Art

of an appropriated modernism particular to

opinions.5 Pakistan’s government increasingly

group of people, primarily due to the lack of

Circle’. It was during this time that the Mayo

Pakistan.

felt the pressure to ‘explain’ Pakistan and to

job security in the arts, the low value of art in

School’s name was changed to the National

Pakistan and the limited infrastructure of the

College of Arts (NCA) – part of a deliberate

Karachi’s art scene developed more slowly, with

national identity, deliberately patronising

art world. In West Pakistan, Lahore was then

transformation of the earlier colonial model

a much smaller coterie of artists participating

arts that fitted with the state’s conception of

the nexus of the art world being, as it was,

for this institution into a national one. With its

in its evolution. Nonetheless, some important

what Pakistan, and a Pakistani citizen, might

the home of major institutions of art and an

pedagogic programme heavily influenced by

figures such as S. Fyzee-Rahamin, who set

be.6 The rise of ‘Calligraphic Modernism’ in

influential circle of people. Figures such as

the aforementioned artists, the NCA allowed

up his studio in the city, made Karachi their

the 1960s, for example, cannot be considered

Shakir Ali, Anwar Jalal Shemza, Hanif Ramay,

for the development of a cadre of practice

base. Other parts of the nation were generally

a wholly autonomous phenomenon within

cut off from the arts, with few artists choosing

recent Pakistani art history. Within this artistic

to step outside of these two urban centres.

development there were many artists – Hanif

The only educational institute for the arts in

Ramay and Anwar Jalal Shemza, for example –

Karachi was the Central Institute of Arts and

who had begun experimenting with calligraphy

Crafts, established in 1966 and eventually

and the developing modernist aesthetics.

headed by Ali Imam (another foreign return),

It was Sadequain who decisively took over

who stressed the importance of teaching art

this genre of practice, however. Relating

histories from all over the globe in order to

to his experimentation with abstractions in

fully develop the student’s critical gaze.

calligraphic forms, Sadequain has said: ‘I

create some sense of a singular and unifying

look upon written words of these languages The 1960s saw concerns of nationalism and

[Arabic and Persian] as aesthetic visual forms

national identity come to the fore within public

and I stress the importance of the shape of

consciousness. The urgency of Partition and

their surrounds.’7 His work was the subject of

its trauma had receded enough that Pakistanis

great interest locally and internationally, and

felt able to grapple with a national identity

Sadequain found eager patrons for his work,

that looked beyond Pakistan being ‘not-Indian’

in 1955 exhibiting at the residence of Prime

and to instead focus on an Islamic identity –

Minister Huseyn Shaheed Suharwardy – a

auditoria and resource centre to aid the work of artists

a shift certainly emphasised by the 1965 war

great benefactor of the arts. This was to be

from various streams (Courtesy: Salima Hashmi)

with India. This perspective gave rise to a great

the start of a fruitful relationship between state

volume of new literature produced by Pakistanis

institutions and the artist.

2. 1. Alhamra Art Centre in Lahore houses the largest permanent collection of artworks. It has exhibition halls,

2. A newspaper clipping of the 1983 conference of women artists in Pakistan. A manifesto was drafted. The manifesto

that endeavoured in its content to elucidate the concept of an Islamic state. Despite agreement

This connection was perhaps an early indicator

the social constitution of the country and their proposed

that such a concept of an ‘Islamic state’ existed,

of the expanding interest of the state in cultural

response to a perceived decline of Pakistan

the debate around its nature reflected varied

production.8 At this time, there was a revival of

articulated the position of these artists with regards to

interest in A.R. Chughtai’s work and although this may present a contradiction to the renewed focus on Islam and the ‘Islamic’ nature of the state which was then so evident, Chughtai’s work inspired by Mughal miniatures presented a harkening back to a gloried Muslim past of the subcontinent and hence it became a popular addition to the developing nationalist rhetoric. It was not only the state that had begun to examine the role of art and culture in society. The Progressive Writers’ Movement, which had its roots in the (pre-Partition) All India Progressive Writers’ Association (AIPWA), and links to the Communist Party of India (CPI), established itself in Pakistan shortly after 1947. A left-leaning, socialist group, the Progressive Movement engaged itself in intellectual debate on a wide range of cultural topics, including questions of identity, culture and the state. Leaders like Faiz Ahmed Faiz spearheaded its discussions that influenced many associated academics. Informal locations such as the Pak Tea House in Lahore were the site of these

the developments that we observe in the

level. This scale of infrastructural shift could

conversations, though at times formalisations

Pakistani art world throughout the 1970s. The

only be achieved by a government that had the

of the discussion appeared as manifestos or

conspicuous absence of a large population

necessary resources and reach.

policy statements, including Faiz’s report

of practicing artists and narrow routes of

Problems of Art and Culture, produced for the

dissemination for the arts were coming to be

The election of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s Pakistan

Standing Committee on Art and Culture in

A few pages from the art manifesto signed in 1983.

considered problems in a nation pushing for

People’s Party to government introduced

1968.

Salima Hashmi, IA Rehman, and Lala Rukh, met at the

modernisation. It was recognised that these

new liberal policies, including a National

could only be rectified by an institutional

Cultural Policy. Throughout his populist

structure that decentralised arts and culture

agenda established during his tenure as

A combination of intellectual interest in the

National Exhibition in the Alhamra Art Centre in Lahore and drafted it. It was signed by 15 women artists to guide them in their struggle for cultural development in

arts, along with the state’s growing involvement

Pakistan

to regional centres that could take on the

president between 1971 and 1973 and prime

in the art world, precipitated many of

(Courtesy: Salima Hashmi)

project of cultural advancement at a local

minister between 1973 and 1977, the general

accessibility to art education was widened, as the government’s approach to arts patronage was to target educational institutes and cultural bodies in an expansion of the federal funding of the arts.9 The educational component included transforming the NCA into a public institution and establishing a Fine Arts programme at Sindh University. Bhutto’s government also set up the Pakistan National Council of the Arts (PNCA) in 1973 and the National Assembly subsequently passed the PNCA Act that provided for ‘the establishment of a Pakistani National Council of the Arts for the patronage, promotion and development of the Arts, and for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto’.10 Article seven of the act enumerated the functions of such a council – focusing on the development of regional art programmes and institutions, and emphasising the need for coordination between regional bodies and the Federal Government.11 Once the PNCA was set up a number of other bodies, including the National Performing Arts Academy, the National Puppet Theatre and Lok Virsa, National Institute of Folk and Traditional Heritage, devised related agendas. The activities of these national entities all highlight the multi-pronged approach of the wider government to promote Pakistani arts and culture. Arguably, this support was, however, limited to activities and ideas that promoted the government agenda, eschewing anything that could be considered controversial. These agendas also demonstrated a desire to archive a national consciousness in some substantive manner, utilising these organisations as spaces in which to collectively house cultural knowledge. This move is very significant, indicating a step beyond the common obligation of Pakistan’s museums – including the Lahore Museum – which, according to their colonial mandate, were still Performance, 2002, opaque watercolour on wasli

functioning as storehouses of the past.12 The importance of such public records had pervaded beyond government, finding voice in

by Aisha Khalid, 35 x 23 cm

the press. On the occasion of Chughtai’s death, an article by Rehman

(unframed) (Courtesy: Corvi-

reiterated the growing concern for an archiving of the developing

Mora, London)

present: ‘Is there any doubt in anybody’s mind about the state’s duty

to protect and preserve the fine Chughtai

with its roots in ethnic strife and the continued

collection which belongs to the people?… To

disintegration of national unity, created a

ignore this rich treasure and let it be anywhere

rich subject matter for artists to explore. This,

other than a national institution would

combined with Bhutto’s social welfare slogan

amount to condemning ourselves as a society

of roti, kapra, makaan (food, clothing, shelter),

of philistines.’13 The addition of modern art

demonstrates the increasing relevance of the

forms and contemporary practice to Pakistan’s

public’s social interest in the nation and its

culture presented an evolving Pakistani history

issues:

‘in development’ that was worth preserving throughout rather than after its progress.

It was a period of mass movements. Movements for the restoration of democracy, for the

Thus the 1970s was a critical decade in which

freedom of press, speech and expression,

the systemisation and institutionalisation of

and the working class struggle for a better

the Pakistani art world took place, creating

economic order. The students resented state

an expansive network for artists around

interference in colleges and universities, and

the country to tap into. This growth of

demanded greater participation in academic

infrastructure and opportunity allowed artists

policy-making and administrative affairs. In

to generate more visibility and stature for their

the rural areas, particularly in the Punjab and

work, while it also promoted the growth of an

the North-West Frontier Province, there were

increasingly substantial artistic community in

peasant movements against the social and

which the semblance of a support structure

political dominance of landlords and for a

for emerging artists – along with the increased

larger share of the produce. In certain cases,

marketability of their creations within new

economic struggle became infused with such

commercial galleries – was to aid their

political fervour that industrial workers tried

One such gallery was

to wrest the administrative control of some

the Indus Gallery, established by Ali Imam in

of the factories, while the tenants in certain

Karachi. Imam’s gallery surpassed the generic

areas tried to eject some of the more vicious

one-person exhibition structure by regularly

landlords.15

collective progress.

organising group shows – a limited occurrence in the gallery circuit at that point. At the same time, with the independence of

How to cut an American pantaloon with belt, 2002,

East Pakistan into the new state of Bangladesh,

Opaque watercolour and gold leaf on wasli by Imran Qureshi,

the political and historical context of the nation

28 x 20 cm (image size)

underwent an enormous shift. This division,

(Courtesy: Corvi-Mora, London)

The years prior to Bhutto’s downfall in 1977 raised the status of the arts and vitalised the artistic occupation, lending it a veneer of respectability and providing a hospitable environment for artists to work in. As a consequence, more and more people felt encouraged to become practicing artists. However, the global rise of Islamism in the late 1970s and early 1980s – seen by the religious appropriation of the Iranian revolution, the success of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Zia-ul-Haq’s military coup and subsequent Islamisation and ‘Shariatisation’ of the Pakistani Constitution – caused a dramatic shift in the nature of cultural production in the Muslim world.16 Under Zia, there was a drastic modification in federal patronage of the arts in Pakistan, along with a cut in funding in order that only ‘acceptable’ projects – that is, those considered religiously appropriate – were were accommodated. Activities like dancing were banned and figurative painting was frowned upon and often censored. Jamil Naqsh, a leading light of Pakistani art, was one of the artists who suffered from these strictures, his nudes being removed from the 1981 National Exhibition before its inauguration. Calligraphy’s Islamic tenor appealed to Zia’s sensibilities and was heavily promoted, as were artists who produced Durriya Kazi and David Alesworth in

such works. Landscape painting was another genre

collaboration with Shah Stainless Steel,

that was saw favour under the new government for,

Sarfaraz Electrician, Sultan Book binding,

as Salima Hashmi suggests,

Sheikh Chamak Patti, Iqbal Chamak Patti,

“land” – rural, fertile, and undisturbed, posed no

Pervez Cinema Painter, Very Very Sweet

challenge to the carefully maintained façade of political

Medina, 1999. Painting 6 ft diameter, box 5’ x 18” x 18”, with stainless steel, Perspex, led lights, sound sensor, sound

‘The celebration of

equilibrium.’17 The imposition of a conservative value system on the Pakistani art world was a microcosm of

system, folder. (Courtesy: Photo: Sawar

the comprehensive transformation of the Constitution

Mushtaq; Collection: Artist)

into a more conservative and Islamist one.

The laws enacted during Zia’s government

We, the women artists of Pakistan having

– specifically the Hudood Ordinance based

noted with concern the decline in the status

upon punishment prescribed within the

and conditions of life of Pakistani women; and

Quran, and that articulated the state’s stance

having noted the adverse affects of the anti-

upon actions such as adultery and non-

reasons, anti-arts environment on the quality

marital intercourse – were seen as inhibiting

of life in our homeland; and having noted

women’s rights and regulating their role and

the significant contribution the pioneering

status in society. This would compel female

women artists have made to the cause of arts

artists to band together in a drive against the

and art education in Pakistan… affirm the

government, thus beginning an underground

following principles to guide us in our struggle

movement within the Pakistani art world with

for the cultural development of our people to

women as the main leaders – a movement that

serve as the manifesto of the women artists of

would have important implications for wider

Pakistan.19

social perspectives of women: ‘The eruption of female consciousness, in art and poetry,

The manifesto was a call to arms for women

radicalised our perception of the place and

and from women, and it emerged as a direct

significance of woman in our middle-class

response to the state’s conservative agenda.

urban culture’.

Salima Hashmi argues that it was at this time

Anwar Saeed working at the Vasl workshop, Gadani, 2001. A workshop

that women artists stopped ‘making what men

with 22 artists in residence was organised at Gadani emphasising the

In 1983 Salima Hashmi, IA Rehman and Lala

did’ and emerged as significant voices.20 The

need for criticality, communication and innovation in work

Rukh met at the National Exhibition in the

feminist artist movement spurred a decade of

Alhamra Art Centre in Lahore and drafted a

experimentation and underground subversion

women artist’s manifesto that was then signed

that invigorated the arts. The 1970s had

by fifteen leading artists; Rabia Zuberi, Abbasi

opened the doors of the art market and the

Abidi, Mamoona Bashir, Salima Hashmi,

following decade continued in a progressive

Lala Rukh, Talat Ahmed, Zubeda Javed,

vein, with more private galleries such as Rohtas

Sheherezade Alam, Jalees Nagi, Birjees Iqbal,

Gallery in Islamabad opening shop. Though

Riffat Alvi, Meher Afroz, Nahid Raza, Qudsia

the country had changed, these galleries were

Nasir and Veeda Ahmed. The manifesto

places in which artistic rebellion could be safely

articulated the position of these artists with

showcased and dispersed. Arguably, Zia’s

regard to the social constitution of the country

regime created a sea change in the Pakistani art

and their proposed response to a perceived

infrastructure his government could not have

decline

introductory

predicted or even desired. His regime instilled

paragraph of the manifesto demonstrated how

a pervasive resistance to state-mandated art

deeply these artists felt about these issues:

forms among artists, which emboldened the

Pakistan.

The

Work by Lala Rukh, Gadani, 2001

groups and members of society. Organised

crash left many of these issues unresolved as

political parties, feminist activists and human

Pakistan moved on to the next stage of its

rights advocates were among those rejecting

history. The repercussions of this sudden shift

Zia’s regime. Initially, the Zia regime had

would be severe, as the concerns raised during

appeased ‘fundamentalist’ elements of the

Zia’s regime were tabled and left to fester. The

nation – the Ulema and other Islamists.

spectre of Zia’s government and its policies

But even they felt that the changes made to

would continue to dog political and social

the governing structure were superficial.

developments in the country for the next two

Furthermore, the government’s ties with the

decades, creating further schisms in the social

United States throughout the Soviet occupation

fabric of the nation.

of Afghanistan brought the government into conflict with its own supporters. The sudden

The election of Benazir Bhutto as PPP

end of the regime with Zia’s death in a plane

President in the subsequent democratic

public to buy ‘unconventional’ artworks as

what has been referred to as the neo-Miniature

a political statement, further entrenching

movement. The first and primary proponents

a political rebellion through the market’s

of this movement include artists Shahzia

affirmation of the protest.

Sikander, Imran Qureshi and Aisha Khalid.

A major turn within Pakistani arts in this

The rebirth of miniature painting and its ties

period was the introduction of miniature

to a romantic interest in the past was echoed

painting as a major to the Fine Arts curriculum

in the revival of traditional architectural

at National College of Arts (NCA) – a project

forms within contemporary design that also

of Zahoor-ul-Akhlaq and Bashir Ahmed. The

sought inspiration from Mughal architecture.

miniature programme within the NCA sought

Architect Kamil Khan Mumtaz spearheaded

to revive this art form, teaching students the

this movement and is widely considered an

traditional methods of composing miniature

authority on the subject.22 Architects since the

1. Participants at Vasl International

paintings, which were then pedagogically

1970s had generally become more sensitive to

Artists Workshop, 2006

juxtaposed with other studio arts that followed

finding indigenous vernacular architectural

Euro-American trends in style and technique.

forms that followed the Pakistani public’s quest

This juxtaposition of tradition and modernity

for a national identity.23

2. Henrik Andersson, ‘ARTshare’, April 2011, Vasl apartment, Karachi 3. Ship of Hope, 2006, work by Anthony Schrag at

arguably had little impact on the first batch

Vasl International Artists’ Residency, Lahore

of miniature graduates in 1984, but it would

The Islamist policies of the Zia government –

eventually lead to a reinvention of the classical

which had intensified this search for national

4. Participants of the ‘Taaza Tareen’ Local Artists’

Mughal miniature that became increasingly

identity through revivalist movements – began

Residency, 2009, artists’ studio at Indus Valley School

popular throughout the 1990s, constituting

to come under severe criticism from various

of Art and Architecture, Karachi

elections of 1993 again catapulted Pakistan

private galleries in Pakistan flourished. An

essential role in adding it to the discourse of art

were generally modelled in a fashion similar to

into the view of an international audience.

important addition to the art infrastructure

practice. All manner of ‘objects’ began to be

UNESCO bursaries for artists. Unlike earlier

Bhutto’s unique position as a female president

was the founding of the Indus Valley School

viewed as having potential artistic application,

colonial incursions into the art world of the

of Pakistan and daughter of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto

of Arts and Architecture (IVS) in Karachi,

with a high degree of

subcontinent, the residency was a collaborative

generated much interest and gave the nation a

the first degree-awarding art school in the

involved.

veneer of egalitarianism then felt to be lacking

city. Founded by a group of architects and

from other Muslim states. Her rise to power also

art professionals, IVS soon gained repute

This new appropriation of vernacular forms

The impetus to bring fresh artistic perspectives

gave hope to the general art community, which

as an institution of high calibre. Offering

gave rise to a period of artistic production that

into Pakistan through the residencies was

sought a return to the liberal policies they had

degrees in fine arts, architecture and textile

was largely collaborative, with the artist and

complemented by international workshops,

enjoyed under her father. Officially, this was

design, the school quickly became a significant

the craftsperson negotiating their respective

which

not to be. The PNCA, which was premised on

gathering point within the arts community of

practices in order to create artworks together

with students from various departments.

the need for a national arts platform, was stuck

Karachi. Many reputed artists and other art

– largely with the former conceptualising that

The academic residency, however, had its

in the past and beset by problems caused by the

professionals began teaching there, creating

work and the latter implementing its physical

limitations. Because of the NCA residency’s

politicisation of government institutions. The

links between the practicing students and the

process. The nature of such partnerships and

small size and its position in the academic

same was true for most federal cultural bodies

wider art world.

dialogues set the stage for other collaborations

world, for young emerging artists there

in the process of art making to take place –

remained little institutional support. Galleries

at this time. The political situation in Pakistan

experimentation

initiative, with local practitioners actively involved in its formation and methodology.

brought

together

foreign

artists

had changed to a semblance of democracy but

IVS decreased the city’s reliance on outside-

most notably appropriating the structure of

existed in plenitude but their commercial

Bhutto’s unstable political system deactivated

trained artists and aided the development of an

the artist residency. The concept of the artist

agenda made them an uneasy and unreliable

any viable federal institutions supporting the

art style deeply rooted in the city’s urban fabric.

residency was certainly not a new one; it existed

space for nurturing creativity and providing

arts. Regardless of these problems, there was a

The simultaneous rise of interest in urban art

within institutional settings for many decades

opportunities for intellectual interaction.

general movement away from heavily political

and public art also helped Karachi develop

outside Pakistan. In fact, Pakistani artists

and politicised art during these years, a shift

into a more vibrant art scene. The concurrent

such as Zahoor-ul-Akhlaq had attended such

So while there was a precedent for residencies

that may well be linked to global developments

rise in interest surrounding traditional art and

residencies internationally and were familiar

in Pakistan, there remained relatively little

in art generally, but also with the increasing

craft forms, as well as urban art forms, was

with its concept – a work-based ‘sabbatical’ for

space for artists to experiment in their practice

popularity of new media and public projects

certainly not coincidental, both deriving from

artists, supported by a host institution.

beyond the commercial spectrum. Within

within art practice – developments that had

an interest in the indigenous. The conceptual

begun filtering into Pakistan through a new

collision of these two styles was very fruitful for

The local emergence of residencies did

Triangle Arts Trust), a network of international

cadre of foreign-educated artists.

many artists including Durriya Kazi, David

not happen until the 1990s, with the NCA

residencies in part administratively conducted

Alesworth, Iftikhar Dadi and Elizabeth Dadi,

establishing a residency programme in 1995.

from the Gasworks gallery and residency

A major advantage of the new political era,

whose work with truck art was a product of

The NCA, with its long established roots as

programme in London, along with the Khoj

however, was that the private cultural sector

these issues. Where truck art and art associated

a leading pedagogical institution, was the

residency in India (also established within

was given new life. Freed from the stifling

with movie advertising had once been firmly

logical location for an academic residency

Triangle), emerged as potential models for

sanctions imposed across the population

relegated to the periphery of Pakistani arts

programme and it created two senior and two

artistic engagement. Robert Loder, who

throughout the 1980s, and combined with

and placed into the category of craft, its

junior residency positions, providing ‘space

established Triangle in 1982 and Gasworks in

art’s greater marketability on a global level,

incorporation into ‘high’ art forms played an

for widening a conversation’.24 Its residencies

1994, began to support the idea of a project

this vacuum, the Triangle Network (formerly

in Pakistan, having met Pakistani artists in

Gadani, with twenty-two artists in residence.

local and one international – facilitating

foundered as members of the original working

London. In 1997 Iftikhar Dadi attended the

A diverse international group of artists were

conversation. In Laura Paddock’s artist

group dispersed, some leaving the country

Khoj workshop in Modinagar, India. As artist

involved.27 Vasl’s stress on Gadani’s specific

statement, the importance of this interaction

and others becoming busy with separate

Huma Mulji states, it was on the occasion that

site is clear in the foreword of the catalogue

is highlighted:

projects and their own artistic practices. Vasl’s

Gasworks and Triangle held an exhibition on

that was printed after the workshop: ‘Every

mapping in 1997 that an institutional forum

workshop in every location has its own flavour.

Our passion for our practice drove our

Rangoonwala Foundation, which supported

opened up ‘South Asia to South Asians’.

A vitality and energy, pulled together by a

interactions – Pushpa advising me without

its continued growth by providing space and

Before such activities South Asian artists had

combination of

forces—location, people,

words how I should install my paintings, our

material. Continuation also came through

rarely interacted with each other in their local

and work process. And so, the first Vasl

collective engagement with Ruby over the

the infusion of new faces. Adeela Suleman,

context.

International Artists Workshop was dynamic,

placement of her gorgeous flock, Jerry catching

Munawar Ali Syed and Roohi Ahmed joined

thought provoking and very much rooted in its own

me in cultural assumptions and amazing with

forces with Amin Gulgee and Naiza Khan

These events motivated a number of artists

cultural space [italics added].’ Also underscored

his talents of transformation, the infectious

to form a new working. The organisation’s

to initiate a two-week international artists’

in the foreword was the importance of such

survivalism of Tang’s humour, Sumaira and

development thus continued and saw the

workshop in Pakistan. The core group at this

workshops in adding criticality and innovation

Roohi’s inspirational collaboration, Lala and

transformation of the residency into an artists’

early stage consisted of Naiza Khan, Samina

to artistic practices in Pakistan:

Nilofar’s dedication and vigilance like Lorelei

collective with a regular residency programme

in the rocks. Ellen’s 360-degree personal

and other associated initiatives, including a

Mansuri, Amin Gulgee and Huma Mulji in

support at this time came in the form of the

Karachi, with Lala Rukh, Maryam Hussain,

Many questions were raised over subsequent

triumph in the ardour of art making, and

second international workshop that took place

Anwar Saeed and Khalil Chishti working from

weeks about the nature of such a workshop, its

the radiance I still feel in Amin’s sensibility

in Gadani in 2006.

Lahore. The initial process was slow, with the

relevance, its role as catalyst, and the resistance

in newfound sculptural elements in my own

working group consisting of artists that were

to change within the hierarchies of our system.

work. I remain fed and saturated with beauty

From 2003, the organisation has held

also maintaining their own practices. The

Such a debate was an important and welcome

and generosity of my reception in Pakistan

regular international residency programmes

first workshop was initially meant to be held

response for us. There is certainly an unfulfilled

and its unique hybridizations and history.

with artists hailing from around the globe.

at a rest house on the outskirts of Lahore, but

need amongst artists within Pakistan to be

the arrangements fell through and eventually

part of a process in which they have a higher

These experiences and the successful reception

Vasl as it began receiving funding from the

Gadani, a ship-breaking yard close to Karachi

stake. There is also a need for communication

of the workshop among artists and the

Ford Foundation through Gasworks as part of a

and just across the border of Balochistan

through work process, with artists working in

general public at the Open Day aided the

programme that targeted South Asian creative

province, was chosen as the site for the first Vasl

the country and elsewhere in the region. These

impetus to continue the Vasl workshop and

initiatives. The funds allowed the organisation

international workshop. The focus and desire

and other issues can be effectively addressed by

solidified plans to structure the programme

to expand its activities and apart from the

for consistent, uninterrupted artist interaction

being part of a broader network.

into something more concrete. The success

international residency, Vasl also initiated a

of Gadani was tempered by the events of 11

local residency programme, Taaza Tareen, in

makes it unsurprising that emphasis was placed

Subsequently, 2004 was an important year for

upon a non-urban, non-central location for the

The workshop was envisioned as a complete

September 2001, which inflicted its inevitable

2004. The local programme served as a vehicle

workshop.26

collaborative experience, with artists residing

effect upon the ambitions of the original

to bring together young artists, providing them

and working together. The organisers also

Vasl working group. The difficulties of travel

an opportunity to create and display work. A

In January 2001, a workshop entitled ‘Vasl

structured discussion sessions into each

complicated the group’s desire to have regular

research residency was also formed, with the

International Artists’ Workshop’ was held at

evening’s activities, with two people – one

international workshops and Vasl’s growth

first residency in 2004 bringing Danica Maier

from Goldsmiths University in London as

art discourse and practice in India. Annual

them to interact with the urban fabric by

most of the new residencies do not parrot the

a textile researcher. The research residency

regional meetings between the regional

placing artworks in various parts of Karachi

goals and models of the Vasl residency. For

combined Vasl’s aims to bring in foreign artists

collectives (in India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and

such as Nazimabad and Bohri Bazaar.

instance, R.M. Naeem’s residency emphasises

and generate educational outreach, with artists

Nepal), have continuously provided a platform

Vasl and Vasl Lahore have also pushed the

the subcontinent’s long-standing tradition

having regular interaction with students at

for coordinators to interact with each other

inclusion of new media practices in Pakistan

local art schools in the form of lectures and

and become more aware of the commonalities

by including a wide-ranging group of people

pedagogical practice – something Vasl, with

joint projects.

Apart from the intangible

of their experiences, as well as to shatter any

in its activities, shifting attention away

its ‘hands off ’ approach to artists’ production

outcomes of Vasl’s activities, there have also

misconceptions. This deepened understanding

from traditional fine arts to expand what is

inside the studio (that is, with regards to what

been physical improvements through the

led to further collaboration and exchanges that

possible within the confines of the collective.

they choose to make on a residency), presents

residencies, such as when Kristine Michael, a

were possible only through the network and

Vasl’s interest in new media also led to the

an alternative to.

ceramicist from Delhi, helped build a salt kiln

which allowed organisations to work beyond

development of its website, with a redesign

at the Indus Valley School.

their own ambit. One of the manifestations

funded by the Ford Foundation. The first

Part of Vasl’s success can be found in the

of this dialogue was the exhibition Six Degrees

significant online portal for viewing Pakistani

continuity of its being a collectively organised

International funding also allowed Vasl

of Separation: Chaos, Congruence and Collaboration

artists’ work, the website created a platform for

institution that, as much as possible, attempts

to solidify its linkages with regional artist

in South Asia, curated by Pooja Sood and

curators and gallerists to view contemporary

to avoid becoming dependant upon the

collectives through its involvement in the

consisting of five editions of the exhibition

art practice in Pakistan and is complemented

energies of single individuals. Instead, Vasl has

Triangle Network, which was formulated to

opening simultaneously in five countries South

by an online newsletter for reporting on

created a structure based upon systems that

support the kind of free space that characterises

Asia – all showcasing works produced by artists

contemporary art and opportunities across the

will continue despite transformations within

Vasl: ‘The Triangle network provides spaces in

during various residencies that had taken place

world. The Lahore group briefly hosted a blog

the organisation. Huma Mulji also credits Vasl

the form of workshops and residencies where

since 2001.

where artists shared their experiences.

with creating a legacy out of which there is a

artists can, and do, work freely. In the West,

the

ustad-shagird

(master-apprentice)

tacit expectation that activities will continue to

we sometimes forget how rare this condition is

Vasl’s programme has had many positive

It is not simply as an independent entity

happen despite all odds.37 This is perhaps the

elsewhere in the world.’32 Numerous Pakistani

effects on the artistic community in Pakistan.

that Vasl has affected the art community in

most important aspect of Vasl’s influence upon

artists also attended workshops and residencies

Although the principal collective was based in

Pakistan – other residencies and programmes

the Pakistani art world.

elsewhere in the Triangle Network, especially

Karachi, with its coordinators and volunteers

have emerged within the country that echo

those in the South Asia network. Khoj Artists’

being located there, residencies have also been

Vasl’s project of

providing opportunities

Examining Vasl and related art collectives from

Association acted as a mentor of sorts for the

held in Lahore and Islamabad. The Lahore

for professional growth to artists. Working

a wider art historical vantage point than the

emerging collectives in the region, including

residency programme, initially run by Huma

with a team of artist board members and

organisation’s own ten year history, it seems an

Vasl, and it is unsurprising to note the close ties

Mulji, has been equally successful. Mulji’s own

coordinators, artist R.M. Naeem also set

almost natural actor in the evolution of art in

Vasl artists feel with Khoj. The relationship

focus upon collaborative public art projects

up a residency programme run through his

Pakistan and, by extension, the international

with Khoj, however, has not been one-sided

has lent itself well to the activities of an artist

studio in Lahore. Naeem sees the residency

system. As Pakistan, like other former colonies,

and both collectives have benefited from the

collective. The Aarpaar art exchange project

programme as coming out of a heightened self-

re-examines its position in the world today, it is

exchange. Pakistani artists attending Indian

between India and Pakistan was one such

awareness and a realisation that artists have a

clearly making a concerted effort to create a

residencies have added their experiences and

initiative that Mulji was actively involved in.

role to play in supporting future generations of

distinct space for itself. In doing so, there has

thoughts, introducing new dimensions to

The project brought artists together and led

artistic practice. It is important to note that

been a realisation that certain elements of the

colonial past that entrenched themselves into

Sculpture in Pakistan 1947-1997, (Karachi: Oxford

individuals who do not permit them to be seen by those who might

local practices were anathema to the traditions

University Press), 1998, 839.

be interested in them.’ Ibid, 345.

3 It is useful to read R. Siva Kumar’s article on

9 In addition to the new Fine Arts Department that had also been

modern art in India for further elucidation of this

established in Peshawar in 1964.

into which they were inserted. The residency, in its malleable form, is far more suitable to the post-colony in that it allows for the iteration of

idea: ‘On the one hand, it presented Indian artists

those distinct identities.

with a way for claiming modernist identity for themselves, and, on the other, encouraged them to

Contemporary art practices and the modes of its production, along with the explosion of information technology, have had a huge role in

reconsider their traditional antecedents.’ R. Siva Kumar, ‘Modern Indian Art: A Brief Overview’, Art Journal 58:3 (1999), 14.

10 Government of Pakistan, PNCA Act 1973. 11 The PNCA Act is particularly vague in its definition of ‘art’ and in specifying which activities the Government could undertake through the PNCA. Article seven also adds a vague proviso to the act whereby the Council could hold enquiries into organisations

shaping our visual culture. The artist collective

4 Salima Hashmi, Unveiling the Visible: Lives & Works

granted funds through the PNCA if such organisations were

is a timely intervention in the art world that

of Women Artists of Pakistan (Lahore: Action Aid

suspected of ‘conducting its activities in a manner contrary to the

harnesses these energies. From an institutional

Pakistan & Sang-e-Meel Publications, 2002), 7.

policy laid down by the Council’. Such general language kept the

perspective, one can see the collective as another part of the art infrastructure that does not seek to replace the art college or the gallery,

Act open to interpretation and re-interpretation, and subject to 5 Ishtiaq Ahmed, The Concept of an Islamic State: An Analysis of the Ideological Controversy in Pakistan (New York: St. Martins Press, 1987), 3.

straddling their educational and professional lives. Within the developing world, where resources are generally scarce, collectives like

6 Islam was felt to be the only answer to this question

Colonial India, (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004).

of national identity as articulated by Professor Waheed-uz-Zaman: ‘If we let go the ideology of

13 IA Rehman, ‘Who Cared for Chughtai?’ Dawn News, February

Islam, we cannot hold together as a nation by any

3, 1975.

other means… If the Arabs, the Turks, the Iranians,

Vasl are integral to ensuring that a healthy art

God forbid, give up Islam, the Arabs yet remain

community in which art practitioners are, for

Arabs, the Turks remain Turks, the Iranians remain

some time, released from the more commercial

Iranians, but what do we remain if we give up

realms of the art world and provided with the

Islam?’ as quoted in William Richter, ‘The Political

space for critical practice.

12 For more on the colonial museum, see Tapati Guha-Thakurta, Monuments, Objects, Histories: Institutions of Art in Colonial and Post-

or even act as an alternative to either. Artist associations occupy a middle space for artists

the whims and fancies of those in power.

Dimensions of Islamic Resurgence in Pakistan’, Asian Survey, 19:6 (1979), 550. 7 S.M. Sadequain and W.K. Bhatty, ‘On My Work

End Notes

as a Painter in Pakistan’, Leonardo 7:4 (1974): 346.

1 Iftikhar Dadi, ‘Art in Pakistan—the First Decades’

8 This is not to say that Sadequain did not benefit

in Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan, (ed.)

from this relationship, he saw the opportunity

Salima Hashmi, (New York: Asia Society Museum,

that state patronage would give him to exhibit his

2009), 39.

works in large public spaces: ‘The reason I prefer

14 Salima Hashmi recalls an incident from this time when she was at NCA. While conversing with colleagues, Shakir Ali entered the room. Upon seeing the young group of artists he commented how lucky they were to have the facility of camaraderie - an element missing at the beginning of his career. Interview with Salima Hashmi, Oct. 14, 2010. 15 Ijaz ul Hassan, Painting in Pakistan (Lahore: Ferozson, 1991), 121. 16 M-Ahmed, ‘Islamization & Sectarian Violence in Pakistan’ Intellectual Discourse 6:1 (1998), 17-18. 17 Hashmi, Unveiling the Visible, 8. 18 Naqvi, Image & Identity, 652.

to paint murals for public buildings stems from 2 Akbar S. Naqvi, Image & Identity: Painting &

my reluctance to make pictures for sale to wealthy

19 Manifesto reproduced in Hashmi, Unveiling the Visible, 193.

100

20 Interview with Salima Hashmi, Oct. 14, 2010.

and Amin Gulgee (eds.) Vasl International Artists’ Workshop 2001: Gadani January 12-26, (Karachi, Pakistan).

21 Potentially, one could also see the growth of the art market and the transference from a collector-oriented market to one based on

31 In the case of Maier, Indus Valley School and the Textile Institute

Free Market principles beginning in this period’s heightened political

of Pakistan.

interest in art. 32 Robert Loder, ‘Experience Lives in the Mind’ in Triangle: Variety of 22 For more see Kamil Khan Mumtaz, Architecture in Pakistan

Experiences around Artists’ Workshops and Residencies, ed. Alessio Antoniolli

(Singapore, 1985).

et al. (London: Triangle Arts Trust, 2007), 18.

23 A deeper examination of other art forms, which parallel the

33 The South Asia Network consists of the following collectives:

evolution of the fine arts, is beyond the scope of this article. In fact,

Britto Arts Trust (Bangladesh), Khoj Artists’ Association (India), Sutra

one may argue that many of the movements within the art world

(Nepal), Theertha International Artists Collective (Sri Lanka), and

stemmed from greater public concerns and art was simply one

Vasl Artists’ Collective (Pakistan).

medium of expressing these issues. 34 Adeela Suleman, the current coordinator of Vasl, sees residency 24 Interview with Nazish Ata Ullah, Oct. 14, 2010.

art practice as independent from studio practice, one that is enmeshed deeply within the context of the residency context. Interview with

25 Interview with Huma Mulji, Oct. 16, 2010.

Adeela Suleman, Dec. 11, 2010.

26 Naiza Khan in conversation has described how the working

35 Board: Mudassar Manzoor, Ali Kazim, Sadaf Naeem, and RM

group accorded great importance to the lack of distractions in

Naeem. Coordinators: Ussman Ghauri and Sadaf Naeem.

remote locations, and how this impacted the success of the workshop experience: ‘we have to deal with each other’. Interview with Naiza

36 Interview with RM Naeem, Oct. 15, 2010.

Khan, Oct. 26, 2010. 37 Interview with Huma Mulji, Oct. 16, 2010. 27 From Pakistan: Aasim Akhtar, Akram Dost, Amin Gulgee, Anwar Saeed, Khalil Chishti, Lala Rukh, Maryam Hussain, Naiza Khan, Roohi Ahmed, Ruby Shaheen, Samina Mansuri, and Sumaira Tazeen, and from abroad: Ellen Ligteringen (the Netherlands), Jerry Buhari (Nigeria), Koralegedara Pushpakumara (Sri Lanka), Laura Paddock (USA), Nayan Kulkarni (UK), Niloofar Chaman (Bangladesh), Rehab-al-Sadek (Egypt), Shauna McMullan (UK), Tang Zhigang (China), and Walter d’Souza (India) 28 Naiza Khan, foreword to Naiza Khan, Huma Mulji and Amin

Fatima Quraishi is an art historian based in Karachi. She has a Masters in History in Art from University of Victoria (Canada) and a Bachelors in History of Art & Architecture (Hons.) from Brown University (USA). Her current research is on the historiography of Islamic art in the Subcontinent. Text commissioned and edited by Vasl Artists’ Collective.

Gulgee (eds.) Vasl International Artists’ Workshop 2001: Gadani January 1226, (Karachi, Pakistan). 29 Khan, foreword. 30 Laura Paddock, Artist Statement in Naiza Khan, Huma Mulji

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the art of change artist, curator and critic quddus mirza in conversation with artists adeela suleman (AS) and gemma sharpe (GS)

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In what ways do you think Vasl, through its various activities,

Hamra Abbas started her video series Left, Right

space in his miniatures and his scale changed

has been contributing towards art in Pakistan?

which became an integral part of her work.

during a residency. Hema Upadhya, an Indian

Riyas Komu had metal structures inspired by

artist, made three-dimensional pieces out of

AS: Vasl has played a pivotal role with its Young Artists’ Residency –

Hindu, Muslim and Christian identities which

matchsticks that were shown time and again at

‘Taaza Tareen’. Lots of young graduates took it as an opportunity and a

later became life-size. Ruby Chisti made a

many venues throughout India. Roohi Ahmed

doorway to the local art scene. Artists like Ali Kazim, Mahreen Zuberi,

remarkable shift from her previous work and

made use of readymade objects and came up

Auj Khan, Mohammad Ali Talpur, Sohail Abdullah and many others

began working with crows and buffaloes in her

with sculptures out of tea sifters.

have been part of these residencies and have taken their work forward

thread sculptures. She maintained this practice

through their experiences at Vasl.

in her later exhibitions also.

GS: It can be really testing for people to spend

so much time around people they don’t know

GS: What Vasl brings to the arts in Pakistan is an alternative way to think

How can an artist benefit from

and don’t necessarily relate to culturally. While

about how an organisation can perform – not just in the sense that its

interactions with others? Do you

the majority of the time a convivial atmosphere

programmes are uncommon, but in the sense we’re neither closed nor

see working within a group brings a

is generated between artists, it’s important

rooted to a particular space. While Vasl’s main base is in Karachi, there

positive change in an artist? Please cite

to recognise that it’s with misunderstanding

is so much potential for our activities to spread around Pakistan, which

a few examples.

and divergence that people really reassess

they do. The concept of a networked organisation is important to the

their opinions and their politics. While artists’

scene here, I think.

AS: Artists can really take advantage of dialogue

aesthetic practices can change in residencies,

amongst each other because not only do they

perhaps more profoundly their political

Do you see a difference that occurs in art practices once

share ideas and make room for considerable

assumptions and ideological foundations can

artists have been through residencies?

amount of growth in their practice but they

also shift. You can’t force that shift in view,

also open themselves to criticism, which

but I think many people who have been on

AS: As a matter of fact, I do see changes and at times they are drastic.

invariably transforms their work and allows

residencies will have some experience of this.

Many artists come to residencies with pre-planned thoughts of what

the artists to associate important thoughts and

they want to do but once they become comfortable within the space

notions related to their work. It definitely has

In the present circumstances, in

they develop an urge to advance and experiment with their works. One

a positive effect on them because then they

which the market is making its mark

can think of many artists who began using video/sound, animation and

are able to see more possibilities within their

everywhere, how can an organisation

performance as their language. Several others moved from 2D to 3D works

tradition and take it in any direction they want.

like Vasl offer new vistas and venues

or amalgamated both practices to discover new meanings in their works.

I remember Irfan Hassan began using white

for artists?

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AS: Works produced at Vasl are really not

of thought. Most galleries associated with

chooses his/her own way of dealing with

even in these difficult conditions Vasl has done

about selling. The idea is to give all artists

institutions, on the other hand, are more

responsibility. Vasl always assists in any kind of

several Public Art Projects at schools and

freedom to experiment and try out different

focused on bringing about the changing face

awareness campaign which the artists want to

universities to bridge the gap between artists

things. It has always been more about the

of art, introducing dialogue based works on

take out in order to engage larger audiences.

and the public. We do exciting and engaging

process. There is an ephemeral quality in

politics, identity, religion, gender, so on and so

An important way to build a relationship

projects in bustling market places, festivals and

these works and even though they might not

forth. Vasl is always welcoming towards artists

with society is holding Vasl ARTshares and

art fairs, which are educational experiences for

survive for too long it does not mean they can’t

who want to explore new ways of working,

ARTstudies. Through such events many artists

the masses. Many times we have collaborated

go into important collections. Vasl has always

regardless of their past practices or connection

get the opportunity to take their works into

with Citizens Archive of Pakistan for their

played an important role in providing space for

with commercial galleries, as long as they are

public spaces like art colleges and universities,

Shanaakht Festivals and more recently their

interaction. Additionally, Vasl also helps artists

open to finding new dimensions in their work.

where students not only become aware of the

exhibitions on history like “Birth of Pakistan”

artist but also pose new questions for the artist.

and “State of Being so Divided” interactive

GS: The art scene here is too small to see much

Study groups are another way of providing

exhibitions on the war of 1971 and separation

of a divide between the mainstream and the

artists with constructive criticism.

of East and West Pakistan.

get in touch with the right galleries and spaces to show these alternative works. GS: We don’t ignore the market because it’s

periphery – the two rub up against each other so

such a big part of the art scene in Pakistan and

closely. Perhaps that’s why the scene here seems

GS: Vasl organises its programmes with social

What role has Vasl played over the

it would be a mistake to say that one artist is

so dynamic, (and full of frictions!) as compared

responsibility in mind, maintaining education

years to make Pakistani art and artists

more interesting than another because they

to London, which is much more divided up

and outreach projects aside from and within the

visible on the international art scene?

make more or less saleable works. I think the

into areas and sections. What this means in

residencies. Those projects have to be carefully

concept of research is important – it’s not

Pakistan is that Vasl becomes a place in which

managed in relation to their participating

AS: Our website is one of its kind that features

necessarily clear to an artist when they’re

the mainstream and the periphery necessarily

artists and audiences in order that they’re as

contemporary, masters and diaspora artists

hanging a show in a commercial gallery

intersect; for example a senior artist might be on

effective as possible and don’t overly prescribe

with samples of their work and contact details.

how they are contributing to knowledge

the same residency as a recent graduate and the

particular rules or values to anyone. In this

Other than that Vasl features an ‘artist of the

and research cultures within their context,

two have to work on an equal footing in order

sense our education and outreach programmes

month’ in its newsletter which is circulated

but at Vasl their contribution is more clearly

for the collaborative atmosphere to succeed. But

are quite ad hoc, reacting to particular

internationally. Most importantly, opportunities

articulated and explored.

as I said before, the discontinuities of practice

opportunities, individuals and situations that

have started appearing in the newsletter

that Vasl can examine can create the most

arise around us.

for artists to directly apply for residencies,

Is there a divide in Pakistani art of

interesting outputs and situations.

workshops and exchange programmes. The

mainstream and periphery, and if

In your view, how one can bring the

Vasl newsletter also showcases news from the

so, how do you position Vasl in this

Do you believe artists have a

masses and general public closer to art

art scene, art events and exhibitions openings,

scenario?

relationship – if not a role and

activities?

across the country.

responsibility – to society? In this

AS: There isn’t a visible divide between

context, how is Vasl operating?

AS: It is very difficult in a country like Pakistan

GS: One of the most important things Vasl

mainstream practices and alternative ones but

to bring art and the masses together. Over

can do in terms of its relationship with the

there are several small and big commercial

AS: I strongly believe artists have a social

here art is still very much about the elite and

international art scene is to provide a platform

galleries that sell an entirely different school

and intellectual responsibility and each

for a select audience in a confined space. But

for research and distribution of knowledge

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about Pakistani art. Often editors, writers,

than India, and so many Pakistanis in the art

your own art practice?

about the aftermath of war. So we really have

artists, researchers and curators come to

world do study abroad and have experience of

no limits in terms of medium.

Pakistan via Vasl’s online presence or through

other countries, which they feed back. Artists

AS: I have been with Vasl since 2001. You

our base in Karachi. We can help to broaden

are willing to engage in the friendships and the

can do the math. As far as its link to my own

GS: Our activities often cross into alternative

and support their networking in a country

fights and that’s great.

practice is concerned I spend less time at the

mediums and showing a video or supporting

studio. But on a serious note it hasn’t actually.

the development of a piece of theatre isn’t

that’s otherwise difficult to access. Being part of the Triangle Network also means we can

What are the aims and agendas of Vasl,

Except that I have become quite close to the

an exception to our rule, or a special ‘treat’

feed back into an international network and

and how far do you think it has been

Pakistani art world.

for our audiences, it’s something that comes

help our partners around the world engage in

able to achieve these?

Pakistani art and artists throughout their own

naturally to our organisation. Sometimes GS: Vasl is the reason I was able to come

we make a point of encouraging practices

AS: It’s quite simple. We want the artists to

to and then eventually move to Pakistan. I’d

that are uncommon in Pakistan – the 2012

come to Vasl and work without any inhibitions.

worked with the Triangle Network, which was

International Workshop for example, which

How do you compare the art world and

Our aims is to make room for practices that are

how I began the correspondence, which was

focuses on performance, sound and video –

artists from here with other regions, for

fresh, distinctive and something the artists may

followed up with a visit and then a residency.

but that’s not because those practices don’t exist

instance with South Asia and the world?

not be comfortable doing at their own studios.

The Vasl flat was an important space for me

within our context. It’s because they already

Vasl is also committed to creating a liberal

in which I was able to ‘settle’ into Karachi and

do, yet would nevertheless benefit from some

AS: If we compare it to India there is a huge

space for experimentation and exchange.

put down roots. Of course given this huge shift

direct encouragement.

from London to Karachi, my own practice has

programmes.

disparity because their work has a mature approach and a different sensibility. Pakistan

GS: I’m interested in the way Vasl can promote

changed profoundly.

comes at a second place in the hierarchy of

institutional development and knowledge

development in art followed by Bangladesh, Sri

through its future activities. What we do doesn’t

Do you plan to extend Vasl’s sphere to

Lanka and Nepal. But I also feel that since we

stop at an exchange or exhibition opportunity

other forms of art and expression such

are almost next to each other there are also lots

for a few people, we allow the wider art scene

as film, theatre, literature, dance, etc?

of similarities in terms of thoughts and issues

to reconsider practice, cultural organisation

Or do you believe visual arts should

that artists deal with and it is primarily because

and the nature of the Pakistani art world

have more priority?

of our shared history and our regional alliance.

itself. The fact that, having engaged with Vasl,

people have been inspired to begin organising

AS: There are no boundaries. Vasl on several

GS: In my experience, the Pakistani art scene

art activities, talks, events and residencies is

occasions has hosted performances based

Quddus Mirza is an artist, teacher, critic and curator

is much more aware of itself as being part of

great. The more sustainable we can become

on music, videos and theatre. Most recently

based in Lahore, Pakistan. Mirza co-curated the first

the ‘international’ than a lot of other countries

as an organisation, the more we can catalyze

we conducted a theatrical performance

major exhibition of art from Pakistan, ‘Beyond

I’ve visited. Artists here are also very savvy

changes that even we don’t get to see.

by collaborating with Zambeel Dramatic

Borders - Art from Pakistan’ at the National

Readings for the VASL/CAP exhibit at the

Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA), Mumbai, India

when it comes to dealing with the international art world (though they will criticise its existence

How long have you been associated with

IVS Gallery. The reading was apt for the

with art critic and historian Saryu Doshi in 2005.He

endlessly). Perhaps it’s because Pakistan has a

Vasl and do you see this relationship

exhibition as it was about the war of 1971 and

writes extensively for newspapers and art magazines.

different relationship with its colonial heritage

having any significance and link with

the stories read out in the performance were

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TIMELINE

suspends the constitution in Pakistan.

referendum extending his Presidential rule for

2005

Pakistan starts selling arms and ammunition to

five more years.

Massive earthquake of magnitude 7.6 in Pakistan-

Sri Lanka.

Daniel Pearl, reporter with The Wall Street Journal,

occupied Kashmir leaves tens of thousands dead

abducted and later killed in Karachi.

on both sides of the LoC.

1997 General elections are held, the fourth time such

2000

The gang rape of Mukhataran Mai, in the village

The Free Trade Agreement between Pakistan

polls were held since 1988. Nawaz Sharif ’s

The Supreme Court of Pakistan validates

of Meerwala, sparks off widespread public

and Sri Lanka becomes operational.

PML-N party wins in a landslide. He is elected

Musharraf ’s coup and gives him executive and

outrage.

prime minister for the second time.

legislative authority for three years.

A shuttle bus bombed in Karachi; 11 of 14 dead

2006

The Council for Defence and National Security

Nawaz Sharif and his family flee to exile in Saudi

were French naval engineers helping to build a

Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti, the Baloch leader and

is established, giving the army an official role in

Arabia.

submarine for Pakistan.

head of the Bugti tribe, was killed in the shelling

running the country.

Iqbal Masih named the recipient of World’s

by Pakistan Army.

Children’s Honorary Award posthumously, for

2003

Sri Lanka asks Pakistan to facilitate the purchase

1998

his struggle for the rights of debt slave children

With substantial victories in the elections, the

of military equipment worth about US$60

Pakistan matches India and explodes five of its

in Pakistan. Masih was gunned down at age 13

Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA), the major

million.

own underground nuclear tests in the Chagai

for speaking out against child labour in carpet

coalition of Islamist parties, brings Pakistan’s

Hills, leading to intensified US sanctions.

factories where he had worked from age 5 to10.

clerics into the political arena as never before. Public sentiment in Pakistan opposes the US

Osama Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri issue

2007 A group of 68 passengers travelling from New

a fatwa with other extremist groups, declaring all

2001

occupation of Iraq.

Delhi to Lahore on the Samjhauta Express are

American citizens legitimate targets of al-Qaeda.

The Agra Summit collapses, as both sides are

Pakistani government declares a unilateral

killed by bomb blasts and a blaze on the train.

Clashes between Islamic fundamentalist groups,

unable to reach agreement on the core issue of

ceasefire along the LoC in Kashmir and indicates

President Musharraf suspends Chief Justice

the minority Qadiani sect Christians claimes

Kashmir.

its willingness to commence bus services.

Iftikhar Chaudhry, triggering a wave of protests

dozens of lives.

Al Qaeda launches terrorist attacks on New York

across the country and declaration of martial law.

and Washington.

2004

Musharraf is forced to resign as the Chief of

1999

Pakistan under Musharraf aligns with the US on

Sectarian and terrorist violence continues

Staff.

Nawaz Sharif and Indian Prime Minister

the Global War on Terror, allows American bases

throughout the year.

About 13 groups unite under the leadership of

Vajpayee, sign the Lahore Declaration.

on Pakistani soil, and shuts down its border with

The suicide bombing of a Shia mosque in

Baitullah Mehsud to form Pakistani Taliban or

Benazir Bhutto and her husband, Asif Ali

Afghanistan.

Karachi, in which 25 people were killed and

Tehriq-e-Taliban Pakistan.

Zardari, are convicted for corruption.

India blames Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-

200 wounded, ignites six weeks of Shia-Sunni

The National Assembly completes its five-year

Pakistani forces occupy positions across the Line

Muhammad for an attack on its Parliament and

bloodletting.

term for the first time in Pakistan’s history.

of Control (LoC) at Kargil in Kashmir.

masses troops on its border with Pakistan.

Suicide attack on Shia muslims in an Ashura

After the passage of a controversial blanket

procession in Quetta claims 45 lives.

corruption amnesty deal, Benazir Bhutto and

eventually withdrawing due to heavy US pressure. General Pervez Musharraf seizes power in

2002

Dr AQ Khan, the father of the Pakistani nuclear

Navaz Sharif are allowed to return from exile.

a bloodless coup, after Nawaz Sharif tries to

War of words between Indian and Pakistani

program, dismissed from his post after he is

Benazir Bhutto, who returned to the country to

dismiss him.

leaders intensifies.

accused of selling nuclear technology to North

campaign in the general elections, is killed in a

Musharraf declares a state of emergency and

General

Korea, Iran and Libya.

bomb attack at a rally in Rawalpindi.

111

Musharraf

wins

controversial

112

2008

‘blasphemous content’.

documentary about acid attacks on women and

General elections held in Pakistan.

Facebook ban lifted after the website promises to

those who help them recover.

Yousuf Raza Gilani is elected prime minister,

make material considered derogatory inaccessible

The Baloch Republican Army (BRA) in Dera

with Asif Ali Zardari, replacing Musharraf as

to users in the country.

Bugti try and execute 6 young men, accused of

president.

Heaviest monsoon rains on record cause

siding with Pakistan.

In the wake of the terrorist attacks in Mumbai,

devastating floods in Pakistan, affecting almost

Pakistan releases 26 Indian fishermen held in

India breaks off talks with Pakistan.

21 million people.

prison for more than two years for violating

Suicide bombing at Marriott Hotel in Islamabad

The North-West Frontier Province renamed as

territorial waters.

kills 53 people. The government launches a

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the 18th amendment to

Militants attack a NATO truck, killing the driver,

major offensive in the tribal areas.

the Constitution.

in Khyber Agency of Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA).

2009

2011

Fearing further attacks, Islamabad temporarily

Government of Pakistan agrees to implement

Campaign to reform Pakistan’s blasphemy law

stops NATO supply trucks from crossing its

Sharia law in Swat valley to persuade Islamist

leads to the killing of two prominent supporters,

border to Afghanistan via its two supply routes in

militants to agree to permanent ceasefire.

Punjab Governor Salman Taseer and Minorities

Khyber Agency and Chaman.

After days of

Minister Shahbaz Bhatti.

After being found guilty of being in contempt

to demands for the reinstatement of judges

Pakistan frees CIA contractor Raymond Davis,

of court for not implementing a Supreme Court

dismissed by former President Musharraf.

who shot and killed two Pakistani men in the

order to reopen a corruption case involving

Militants attack bus carrying the touring Sri

streets of Lahore, after the US paid $2.34 million

President Zardari, Prime Minister Gilani is

Lankan cricket team. All international cricket

in ‘blood money’ to the victims’ families.

deemed to be ineligible to hold public office.

matches in Pakistan are suspended and the

Osama bin Laden killed in a unilateral operation

country loses its status as a co-host of the ICC

by American special forces in Abbottabad,

Cricket World Cup 2011.

Pakistan.

The remains of Baloch National Movement

Pakistani troops recaptured the PNS Mehran

president Ghulam Mohammed Baloch and

base in Karachi after a 16-hour battle with as few

two other nationalist leaders are discovered in

as six Taliban gunmen, who had launched their

Baluchistan, six days after they were reportedly

brazen attack to avenge the killing of Osama bin

abducted by armed men, leading to unrest in the

Laden.

province.

Pakistan’s

A bombing takes place on inside a Shia procession

declaring the US drone strikes in the tribal areas

commemorating the day of Ashura in Karachi,

as a violation of sovereignty.

protests, government yields

Parliament

passes

resolution

killing over 30 people and inciting arson. 2012 2010

Pakistani director Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy

Pakistan blocks Facebook and You Tube for

wins her country’s first Oscar for Saving Face, a

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theertha : a journey by a collective of restless artists anoli perera

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118

The Colombo-based Theertha International Artists Collective celebrates its

to the conventional and established art. Within

had spearheaded the1990s art transformation.

twelfth year of existence in 2012. An ideologically based organisation managed

this, many attempts were made by artists and

As such, these individuals and Theertha

by a group of 17 visual artists, Theertha supports and propagates experimental

individuals to support the newly emerging

automatically became the bearers of the 1990s

and socially critical/interventionist art that emerged in Sri Lanka in the 1990s

radicalism

corresponding

art legacy, with Theertha’s vision invariably

and is now popularly known as the ‘90s Trend. Nearly 15 years have passed

ideologies of contemporary art by establishing

holding the same liberating stance of the 1990s

since the emergence of the ‘90s Trend, which came out of a situation of political

alternate art spaces, alternate art educational

art that leaned towards the experimental. The

anarchy and social chaos. Sri Lanka was grappling with a legacy of postcolonial

institutions and alternate group efforts. The

collective worked with a mission to stimulate

problems; in 1988 a violent youth uprising in Sinhala society took hold of the

‘90s Trend was thus seen as a serious epistemic

the art community into engaging in a broader

southern part of the country and long-drawn armed conflict due to ethnic

break in Sri Lankan visual art history.

spectrum of creative possibilities that opened

and

root

its

issues terrorised the north and north-east. These dynamics have consequently left their mark on all aspects of life in the country.

up with the shift in thinking in the visual arts. If one were to try to locate Theertha in this

Theertha was also the logical next step in

contemporary art history, then it would be

the culmination of activities by many restless

The art of the 1990s emerged in the context of this chaotic and complex socio-

placed at the point where the ‘90s Trend

artists who were interested in finding ways to

political situation. The new art reflected an insistent interest in socio-political

completed its first phase as a movement where

deal with their own socio-political dilemmas,

narration, documenting the violence and destruction of war; it also treated

its primary ideological positions were firmly

the anxieties of taking a different position to

subjectivity as a casualty of urban myth while approaches with a sense of

established and the art of the future – and the

the officially sanctioned art and an urgency to

feminist criticality and identity politics were also discussed. In addition, artists

new millennium – awaited new interpretations

connect with the outside art world.

were intensely engaged in socio-cultural critiques of the effects of globalisation,

and directions.

extreme consumerism and the emerging youth culture. Its evolution into the

There have been other important moments

next decade saw a complex set of dynamics at play within the visual art field,

Theertha was initiated in 2000 by a

where radical artists have rallied together to

giving room to the popularising of the idea of ‘alternative’ as the ‘critical other’

congregation of 11 artists, many of whom

illustrate their stance. As early as 1992, a group

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120

of artists who were also the main proponents

sponsoring a number of innovative exhibitions

of the ‘90s Trend established the Vibhavi

Academy of Fine Arts as an alternative to the

Chandraguptha Thenuwara, Anoli Perera,

well-known government art school, the Institute

Muhanned Cader, K Pushpakumara, Kingsley

of Aesthetic Studies (now known as University

Goonatilake and the important exhibition

of Performing and Visual Arts). It was a bid

Made in IAS which showcased cutting edge

to confront the latter’s archaic curriculum and

art by students of the Institute of Aesthetic

parochial methods of teaching. In the mid-

Studies, curated by Jagath Weerasinghe. The

1990s, the philanthropist and patron of the

Sansonis were also the primary art collectors

arts Ajitha de Costa initiated the alternative

at the time who endorsed the new art and

art space, The Heritage Gallery, which for

purchased most of the key artworks of the ‘90s

several years showcased the experimental

Trend for their private collection.

artists such as Jagath Weerasinghe,

art of the 1990s and became a place where radical artists congregated. In 1997 Sharmini

Theertha emerged as the next phase of this

Pereira, a young curator based in the United

history, as a response to the immense need to

Kingdom, curated a collection of 1990s art and

connect with the outside world and to carve

presented the works as emerging new trends in

out a space, literally and metaphorically,

contemporary Sri Lankan art in the exhibition

which supported and nurtured the innovation,

New Approaches held at the National Art Gallery

experimentation, theorisation and criticality

of Colombo. In 2009, artists closely associated

that the art of the 1990s introduced. Theertha

over the years, the infrastructure, art education

with the ‘90s Trend formed the No Order

began its journey with the intention of

and the overall perceptions and attitudes towards

Group, which organised a seminal exhibition

facilitating international art exchanges and its

the visual arts did not change to accommodate the

of their work and issued a manifesto declaring

first two years were devoted to this purpose.

demands of the new art. Neither the government nor

their position on art.

Theertha’s initial break into the funding of

private patrons were forthcoming in a progressive

culture and art came with the International

way. State sponsorships were embroiled in parochial

The efforts of these artists were supported by

Art Workshop in 2001, where a substantial

politics and corporate attention was directed at high

other institutional structures and individuals,

grant from the Prince Claus Fund supported

visibility events such as cricket matches. A handful of

such as the Goethe Institut and its director

art exchanges across artistic, geographic and

art galleries had emerged since the 1980s, although

at the time, Stephan Dreyer, who is credited

ethno-religious boarders. The success of

they mostly functioned as retail shops to sell art rather

for introducing and supporting the idea of

this workshop energised the group dynamics

than representing artists in an organised manner.

international workshops – these generated

of Theertha and inspired them to continue

At the same time, the state was not interested in art

considerable enthusiasm for international

their cause for a more engaged practice of

other than what was defined as ‘traditional’ or related

exchanges. Gallery 706 (now known as

art. Although Sri Lankan art had changed

Barefoot Gallery) and its directors Dominic

ideologically by adjusting to contemporary

and Nazreen Sansoni supported the new art by

anxieties and the art community had expanded

121

Broken Hands on the Wall,

to what it perceived as ‘heritage’. Furthermore, art

2002, an installation by

education had a very low priority within the state’s

Pradeep Chandrasiri

education and cultural policies.

122

Within this complex context the new art being produced in the 1990s, presenting a different aesthetic sensibility to the conventional did not find enthusiastic endorsers. In many ways, Theertha’s art activities were shaped and defined in an attempt to navigate within this regressive environment. Therefore, while the initial objectives primarily focused on art exchange, Theertha has over the years also engaged with other aspects of visual arts. The primary concern for Theertha was to build its own art audiences and to expand its ideology so that a large support base for its kind of art could be established. The gap that had grown between the conventional art patrons, largely from the English-speaking and Colombo-based cultural elite, and contemporary artists who mostly come from nonelite, non-English speaking and difficult economic backgrounds, and whose art was alien to the norm, guaranteed a disconnection from art-buying audiences. The disillusionment that the 1990s artists felt within the art community energised groups such as Theertha to look for endorsements outside of Colombo and outside of Sri Lanka. Hence, its heavy involvement with programmes such as art teacher training and art workshops in regional areas within Sri Lanka and their commitment to networking internationally. One of the important steps for Theertha in its historical trajectory was its involvement with the South Asian Network for the Arts (SANA). In 2004, the progressive New Delhi-based arts initiative, Khoj, was instrumental in setting up a network for the arts within South Asia, to connect artists involved in experimental and dynamic art within the region. Khoj managed to harness the group energies of Theertha, Vasl (Pakistan), the Britto Arts Trust (Bangladesh) and Suthra (Nepal), all alternative art initiatives to work towards creating a collegiality and cooperation that later became known as the South Asian Network for the Arts. With SANA in place, Theertha found its own peer community within a regional/international setting that understood their anxieties, frustrations and aspirations and which, in a way, was being misunderstood in its own country. Its art found endorsement

Burnt City, a sculpture by

and appreciation within these groups. With eruptive geo-politics and

Sarath Kumarasiri

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developmental anomalies sweeping across

(Tamil insurgent groups and Sri Lankan

Tigers in the backdrop of a faulty and short-

replaced by ‘curiosity, self-reflection and self-

South Asia, most of the experiences of groups

military) without a real solution in sight.

lived ceasefire. While such attempts were seen

enjoyment,’ which predominates a rational

within SANA had similar bearings. Art that

The emergence of the extreme ideologies of

by some as anti-patriotic, and Theertha and

consciousness rather than ‘perplexity and

was produced by them engaged in parallel

Sinhala Buddhist nationalism in the south,

its members were castigated as traitors by

tragic irony’ towards social chaos.

themes and approaches.

the general intolerance of Tamils as ‘enemies’

extreme members of the art community and

within the dominant ‘national’ psyche, and

elsewhere, these remain Theertha’s intensely

Theertha also continues to push its ideas of

The initial years with SANA intensified

the virulent forms of Tamil nationalism

cherished, ambitious and most impacting

art by forging alliances with other discourses

Theertha’s energy and credibility. Activities

that groups such as the LTTE propagated,

activities. One can now see these younger

such as feminism, cultural studies, archaeology,

such

and

demanded counter-discourses from groups

artists taking art into other dimensions, while

human rights and post-colonial studies.

workshops increased, and international art

such as Theertha which were critical of

acknowledging the roots of their practice in

This liberality in the fusion of knowledge

exchanges

member

chauvinist politics and their representations

1990s art. In the 1990s, imagery with new

has allowed boundaries of

groups. The international art residencies

in the cultural domain. This situation nudged

methodologies manifested in a somewhat raw

art hierarchies as well as perceptions and

and workshops regularly held by Theertha

Theertha to initiate publications – sometimes

form because of the immediate proximity of

ideologies of art and craft to be redefined,

showcased its experimental approach to art.

through partner organizations – on art and

the artists to the events they were narrating,

and for younger contemporary artists to

Performance art, earth works and installations,

culture with a critical edge. Published in

and also because the aesthetic vocabulary they

draw from a much larger pool of knowledge.

relatively new art forms to Sri Lanka, also

Sinhala, Tamil and English, much of the

opted for was still evolving. This is very clearly

Popular culture, mundane objects, profound

had the opportunity to expand and evolve

content of these publications (Patitha, Panuwal,

seen in the early works of Theertha artists,

subjects of heritage and national politics are

at Theertha-sponsored events. Born out of a

Artlab and South Asia Journal for Culture) focused

Jagath Weerasinghe (Who Are You Soldier/Broken

discussed with equal seriousness, sanguinity

chaotic situation that resulted in civil war, the

on the arts and ‘culture’, have become key

Stupa), Pradeep Chandrasiri (Broken Hands) and

and criticality. The feminist criticality in art

1990s art ideology and Theertha were both

texts presenting alternative readings of

Sarath Kumarasiri (No Glory). What is seen

that started to emerge with the ‘90s Trend, in

sensitive to volatile ethnic sensibilities, which

culture and art for students at the university

now among the younger group of Theertha

particular, found continued support through

had from the early 1980s evolved into an armed

level and beyond.

artists, is this aesthetic vocabulary being

Theertha. The exhibition, ‘Reclaiming Histories:

developed into more subtle aesthetic formats,

Retrospective Exhibition of Women’s Art’ (2000),

international strengthened

residencies within

conflict between Tamil Guerrilla groups – the

conventional

most prominent of them being the LTTE –

The long-term friendships with members of

discussing micro-themes at a deeper level and

curated by Anoli Perera and showing works by

and the Sri Lankan government. While it did

the Tamil artists’ community in Jaffna and

investigating intimate and highly personal

50 female artists under the patronage of the

not associate itself with political regimes either

the sympathies towards the predicament of

experiences. If the’90s Trend opened up the

Vibhavi Academy of Fine Art, can be seen as

as an endorser or opponent, Theertha was

Tamils as a besieged ethnic community in Sri

possibilities of ‘aligning personal pain with

one of the early attempts at building awareness

concerned with the effects of war and conflict

Lanka ensured that Theertha continuously

that of society, and thus the artist portrays

of women’s art influenced by the ‘90s Trend.

on society, and its human predicament.

maintained collaborative art programmes with

himself/herself as the suffering individual

While the feminist lobby in Sri Lanka has been

Coming from the south of the country and

Jaffna artists. These collaborations allowed it

on behalf of others implying a self-inflicted,

active for a long time, their involvement with

with predominantly Sinhala and Buddhist

to organize the seminal exhibition Aham-Puram

vicarious punishment’ (Broken Stupa by Jagath

visual art has been somewhat aloof. As such,

membership, Theertha was burdened with the

in 2004 at the newly rebuilt Jaffna Public

Weerasinghe,

Pradeep

even if thematic investigations of women’s

same guilt most progressives and liberals in the

Library. Here 72 experimental artworks were

Chandrasiri), the present art moves towards

issues were attempted by artists, there was no

country were feeling in the face of the intense

shown amidst a war-torn area run partly by

a tendency where the personal is investigated

consistent discourse or an orientation where

violence inflicted by the conflicting parties

the State military and partly by the Tamil

within an intimate mood, and the ‘suffering’ is

women’s art could find role models, guidance

125

Broken

Hands

126

1. Recalling Individual Hardship, 2006, a collection of works by Sarath Kumarasiri exhibited at the ACROS Fukuoka Cultural Gallery, Fukuoka, Japan 2. Shirt, 2007, a work by Sarath Kumarasiri 3. Weapons of Mass Destruction, an installation from the Celestial Fervor exhibition, 2009, by Jagath Weerasinghe 4. Soldier in the Cloud, a 3-dimensional work from the Celestial Fervor exhibition, 2.

127

2009, by Jagath Weerasinghe

128

or cues to indicate a particular direction to a locally rooted feminist approach. Due to this, during the initial period, some women’s art reflected ad hoc appropriations of theoretical elements from Euro-American feminism without really reworking it to merge with local experiences. It has to be acknowledged that the ideological liberalization that came with the ‘90s Trend allowed feminist discourses to be absorbed into the thinking processes of art; this liberalised approach also gave rise to the radical use of imagery, art methods and narrations with a high sense of criticality that needed a certain boldness and an element of risk-taking. This added extra pressure on women artists to go beyond their conventional roles (as artist and as woman) to be radical and work within the art discourse of the ‘90s Trend. Theertha’s contribution to the evolution of contemporary women’s art has been to provide the muchneeded intellectual basis and the subaltern/localized approach, informed by feminism, to women’s art that goes beyond the theoretical definitions presented by EuroAmerican feminism and its art trends. The personalities and works of female artists associated with Theertha and its overall support for women’s art through exhibitions and art publications have also helped to establish a certain identifiable particularity associated with women’s art that has a critical edge. Many female artists of the younger generation are influenced by this particularity and the thematics of such art. Between 2005 and 2008, Theertha’s art programmes gave emphasis to supporting young female artists who were graduating from art colleges to continue their practice and experiment with new ideas. This allowed them A detail from a series of sculptures

129

to initiate a process of forming their own identities

called Numbed by Bandu Manamperi

as artists. The Women Artists’ Colloquiums and

at Pradharshana Wasanthaya at Red

International Women Artists Residencies were initiated

Dot Gallery, 2009

during this period.

130

exhibitions.

Jagath

Weerasinghe’s

latest

With the end of the 30-year armed conflict

exhibition, Celestial Fervor, presented a deeper

in May 2009, Sri Lanka experienced a sigh

and more sophisticated elaboration of the

of relief at the cessation of the massive

thematic he has engaged with since his 1994

human and material destruction that for so

show Anxiety that essentially provided the new

long paralysed as well as brutalized the entire

parameters for 1990s art. Similar attempts

society. While this was a major situational

have been seen in recent exhibitions by other

change that allowed artists to connect and

Theertha artists such as Sarath Kumarasiri

work together much more easily with the

(Kovils Temples) and K Pushpakumara (Goodwill

north and north-east, it also ushered in an

Hardware) as well as the younger generation

unbearably nationalistic political rhetoric

of artists, Anura Krishantha (Chairs), Bandu

from the victors who seemed superficially

Manamperi (Numbed), Sanath Kalubadana

and patronizingly

and Pala Pothupitiya (My Ancestral Dress and My

remained racist, anarchistic and violent. Some

ID).

of the exhibitions mentioned above such as

inclusive but, in reality,

Numbed, Celestial Fervor, and Goodwill Hardware

In 2007, frustrated with the lack of flexibility in private galleries and their inability to understand the needs of contemporary art, Theertha transformed part of its office building into an art space. Over the past three years, Theertha has been concentrating on establishing Red Dot Gallery as an experimental art venue and to build its audiences and patronage. Concentrating on keeping certain established standards in its gallery practices, curatorship and presentation of exhibitions, the Red Dot maintains a selection process privileging experimentation and innovation. It has introduced the annual gallery season Pradharshana Wasanthaya to

1. Details from the exhibition

showcase innovative solo exhibitions and present new and cutting-

Goodwill Hardware, 2009, by

edge works of young and mid-career artists.

K. Pushpakumara 2. Chairs with Toy Guns,

In many ways, Theertha’s numerous activities have managed to

an installation by Anura

propel the 1990s art into other directions. Many of its members,

Krishantha

some of whom were instrumental in initiating the ‘90s Trend, have been active in sustaining the criticality and experimental nature of their art-making, presenting extremely innovative and seminal

131

3. Details from the exhibition Goodwill Hardware, 2009, by K. Pushpakumara

132

such as Aham- Puram exhibition in Jaffna in

Imagining Peace, inviting artists to think

2004. Such projects involved negotiating with

beyond the initial ‘relief ’ of ending war

many government and private institutions,

and much celebrated ‘victory’. The second

individuals and groups in the communities

Colombo Art Biennale, held in February 2012

where the work was done. This role of the

and titled Becoming, continued this attempt

artist as a negotiator, educator and heritage

of contextualizing art within the current

manager was something that came out of

mood of the country. The initial ideas for the

long-term engagement with a spectrum of art

biennale as well as the themes for both events

activities that Theertha was engaged in during

were formulated by Jagath Weerasinghe and

the 12 years of its existence. The evolution of

some Theertha artists were members of the

contemporary art in the post-1990s decade

Biennale’s Artistic Advisory Board. This has

has also seen this particular role emerging for

allowed Theertha to be closely affiliated with

by Theertha artists responded to this post-war

the artist; a role that is combined with a sense

the Colombo Art Biennale and its activities.

socio-political situation in the south, recording their

of social responsibility and a belief that art is

The local art scene has grown to include new

suspicion, anxiety and frustration. The recent art of

a civilizational tool, and therefore that artists

patrons and galleries even though the need

artists such as T. Shanaathanan, Pala Pothupitiya

have the power to transform and intervene in

for more is still acute. Other groups such as

and Pradeep Thalawatte specifically comment on

the perceptual processes of art audiences. The

Coca and Colombo Artists have emerged,

the post-war anxieties of divided communities, lost

massive emotional and physical destruction

taking visible stands in terms of presenting

identities and the nature of geopolitics, as well as

of the long-drawn-out ethnically coloured

current inclinations of contemporary art and

probing the ‘reality’ of peace at the end of war.

civil war that ended in 2009, as well as the

connecting with other art communities in the

extensive need for developmental activities and

South Asia region. At the end of the 12 years

a heightened awareness of human and cultural

since its inception, Theertha’s initial purpose

contemporary art has continued intensely in the

rights, have dictated the overall public debates

for its existence – as a platform allowing for

post-war period, Theertha’s

activities have also

in Sri Lanka. As an inheritor of an art ideology

art exchanges to happen across geographic,

focused on interpreting the artist’s role in broader

that equated ‘personal’ with ‘political’ and

ethnic, religious and artistic borders – has

platforms for intervention, including heritage

considered critical engagement as an integral

been overtaken by other priorities. These

While

its

preoccupation

with

supporting

management as art projects. Bordering between

1. Love that Cannot be Expressed:

element, Theertha was highly receptive to the

include but are not limited to: art knowledge

community

War, Soldiers and Memories in

nuances of these debates. This receptivity is

production and dissemination; the need for

archeology, programmes such as Ape Gama (Our

Everyday life, an installation, 2007,

reflected in Theertha’s myriad activities where it

effective art educational programmes for

Village) and Let’s Take a Walk encouraged artists to

by Sanath Kalubadana

has combined certain aspects of social services

higher learning; gaining visibility for Sri

work with selected communities to rediscover their

2. History of Histories, an installation at

with art, thereby producing a unique image of

Lankan contemporary art in international

own contemporary heritage and make cultural

Aham-Purum exhibition by

the artist as a socio-cultural entrepreneur.

forums; opening up interesting platforms

maps of their own localities. These programmes

Jaffna artists in 2004

appealed to the same interventionist sentiments of

3. + and -, an installation, 2005, an

Colombo held its first Biennale in 2009

collaborative work internationally. Such needs

Theertha which inspired it to undertake projects

installation by Thistha Thoradeniya

(Colombo Art Biennale) with the theme

require an approach with different emphasis

133

art,

heritage

management

and

for

contemporary

artists

undertake

134

as well as the forging of new partnerships.

and innovation by their peers. Therefore,

Colombo Art Biennale and Theertha’s long

Theertha’s future existence depends on its

term art initiative, the Sethusamudurum Art Project

ability to get the continuous support from its

with No.1 Shanthi Road, Bengaluru, have

senior members, understand new demands of

been two such partnerships. Theertha, which

contemporary art, sustain fresh energy and

started in 2000 as a young artist group, remains

find new relevance in an art scene that has the

at present a matured and well-seasoned group

potential to boom.

of artists with far more personal commitments and priorities in their lives than earlier. Their

(An initial draft of this essay was first published

art is constantly scrutinized for maturity

by the Asia Art Archives)

135

Burn Landscape, 2011, a work by Pradeep Thalawatte

136

TIMELINE

2002

Tamils in areas controlled by LTTE do not vote.

2010

Norway-brokered ceasefire agreement between

Free Trade Agreement between Pakistan and Sri

President Rajapaksa wins with a resounding re-

the LTTE and the Sri Lankan government comes

Lanka becomes operational.

election victory.

1997

into effect.

Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission

The civil war continues unabated between the

Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission (SLMM) is

2006

(LLRC) is formed to inquire into and mandated

Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the

established as a body that would monitor the

Eelam War IV begins in Sri Lanka. Attempts

to investigate the facts and circumstances which

ceasefire and enquire into reported violations of

to begin peace talks in Geneva fail, and the A9

led to the failure of the ceasefire agreement.

the ceasefire agreement.

Highway closes again.

General Sarath Fonseka is arrested and sentenced

1998

A9 highway, linking Jaffna peninsula and the rest

Seventeen aid workers – 16 Tamils and one

in a variety of crimes including treason by a

Lorry packed with explosives detonates at the

of Sri Lanka, opens after 12 years.

Muslim – with the Paris-based Action Contre

military court in Sri Lanka.

La Faim (Action Against Hunger, ACF) executed

2003

allegedly by government forces.

2011

reporting.

Negotiations continue in early 2003 between the

European Union declares the LTTE a terrorist

UN finds ‘credible allegations’ with regard to

LTTE shoots down a Lion Air Flight. Everyone

United National Party (UNP) government headed

organisation, a step taken earlier by the United

violations of international human rights and

onboard is killed.

by Prime Minister Wickremesinghe and LTTE.

States, Canada, India, and the United Kingdom.

humanitarian law during the final stages of the

Massive LTTE offensive is launched in Kilinochchi.

The LTTE withdraws from the talks.

Peace talks stalled, Norway pulls back from its

2007

Frequent incidents of firing on Indian fishermen

mediating role.

Sri Lankan government regains full control of

by the Sri Lankan Navy leads to tensions.

President Chandrika Kumaratunga narrowly

the Eastern province.

Hundreds of

escapes an assassination attempt. The bomb kills

2004

Police evict hundreds of Tamils out of Colombo,

demanding to know the whereabouts of their

26 others.

Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan breaks away from

citing security concerns.

family members abducted by ‘white van squads’.

the LTTE to form a pro-government outfit.

2000

Kumaratunga dismisses Wickremesinghe, and

2008

2012 UN Human Rights Council adopts a resolution

government forces.

outer gates of the Temple of the Tooth in Kandy. President Kumaratunga orders censorship on war

1999

conflict in Sri Lanka.

people protest in Colombo

appoints Mahinda Rajapaksa as prime minister.

Sri Lankan government formally abrogates

gives wide powers to the military.

Tsunami waves kill over 30,000 people.

the 2002 ceasefire agreement, and launches a

urging Sri Lanka to investigate alleged abuses

Norway offers to mediate between the government

massive offensive.

during the final phase of war with Tamil Tigers.

and LTTE.

2005

India votes in favour of the resolution.

Government and LTTE sign Post-Tsunami

2009

Presidential pardon frees former army chief,

2001

Operational Management Structure (P-Toms)

Former Tiger leader Karuna sworn in as Minister

Sarath Fonseka.

An LTTE suicide attack the air force base and the

by which the two entities agree to offer relief.

of National Integration, and later appointed

Buses carrying Sri Lankan pilgrims attacked in

adjoining Bandaranaike International Airport in

Lakshman Kadirgamar, Sri Lankan foreign

Vice President of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party

Tamil Nadu.

Colombo.

minister, assassinated by a sniper.

(SLFP).

For the first time in Sri Lanka’s parliamentary

Supreme Court of Sri Lanka rejects Kumaratunga’s

Conflict in Sri Lanka comes to an end with the

history, the president and prime minister are

claim that she could remain in office until late

killing of Velupillai Prabhakaran.

from two different parties, leading to an uneasy

2006. Mahinda Rajapaksa is elected leader of the

Militants attack bus with the touring Sri Lankan

cohabitation.

SLFP and wins the presidential elections; most

cricket team in Lahore.

Sri Lankan government imposes censorship and

137

138

139

140

bangladesh art in retrospect a socio - political overview abul mansur

141

142

A comparatively young country on the world

specificities as well as to the nation’s ability to

the contrary, erstwhile East Bengal opted in

here – were we Muslims first or Bengalis first?

map, Bangladesh shares inheritances with

negotiate issues conspicuously, in a manner

favour of Pakistan and in 1947 became the

Fortunately, most of our artists did not opt

other countries of the Indian subcontinent.

different from the other countries of the

eastern wing of the newly created nation.

for communal identity; they upheld instead a

However, its distinctive features are also

subcontinent.

Pakistan was founded on the basis of a

secular heritage. Indeed, the realisation of the

communal identity and the rulers of the

people of East Pakistan that they were subjected

evident: situated at the north-eastern corner of the subcontinent and somewhat secluded

It used to be called East Bengal. In those

country propagated an Islamic heritage,

to political and cultural discrimination came

from its civilisational mainstream activities,

days, it was inhabited by a vast Muslim

disowning all traditions of Buddhist and

as early as 1952 when a number of people

it is inhabited by a large Muslim majority

population who were mostly peasants and

Hindu culture there. Urdu was declared the

laid down their lives to uphold the dignity

population quite unlike in the surroundings

largely illiterate. Nearby Kolkata (Calcutta)

national language and Bengali, which was the

of their mother-tongue, routed the Muslim

areas. Its political history, too, has taken a

was leading the so-called ‘Bengal Renaissance’

mother tongue of the majority in Bangladesh,

League in the 1954 election and opted for a

course evidently different from its neighbours

a political, intellectual and cultural resurgence

was looked down upon as the language of the

democratic and secular society. The pioneers

in the region.

of the Indian people in the nineteenth century

Hindus. The arts and culture of the Bengalis

of the art movment must have taken note of

(Kolkata was then the Imperial capital), yet

and the secular heritage of the region came

these events and were inspired by them. Those

The political fate of the people of Bangladesh

East Bengal had little or no participation in

under continuous harassment. In this adverse

artists of the 1940s had a good training in the

has experienced dramatic changes, including

it. The so-called `Bengal Renaissance’ had no

situation, the modern art movement of a new

naturalistic art style in Kolkata and might have

an armed struggle for independence, during

impact here; neither the emergence of a class

nation began. The initiators were a handful of

absorbed influences of the Bengal School as

the last fifty years or so. The evolution of the

of enlightened intelligentsia among educated

Muslim artists who were trained in Kolkata

well as Jamini Roy. They tried to depict the

social and cultural identity of Bangladeshis is

Bengalis nor the establishment of an art

and were living there until the partition of

rural life and nature of Bangladesh in various

very closely related to its political development.

school and the emergence of a nationalistic

India forced them to migrate to East Pakistan.

figurative idioms, attempting to comment

Thus, an understanding of the development

art movement in Kolkata in the early years of

of visuals arts in Bangladesh is more accessible

the twentieth century provided any influences

In this way, from the beginning of the Pakistan

and political distress. But the crisis was yet

by considering historical and sociological

on the cultural atmosphere of this region. On

period there was a crisis among the people

to be overcome. When these contemporary

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on human conditions in a state of natural

144

artists looked for inspiration from within their

in our country is a sort of free abstraction

heritage, they found that most of the lofty

inspired by the abstract expressionists of

idols of our civilization were situated beyond

the 1950s but, more often than not, lacks

the geographical boundary of East Pakistan/

a philosophical basis and social context

Bangladesh. Only `Pala’ could be called truly

and thus ends up somewhere very near to

ours, but its expressive format was inadequate

decorativeness. Gradually, it became confined

for a modern artist. The only impetus could

to a selective group of elite connoisseurs and

come from the very rich folk tradition of this

consumers, and thus has lost contact with

region. But very few artists of erstwhile East

the ethos of more crucial, contemporary

Pakistan paid attention to it.

issues. Neverthless, it is not forgotten that a few practitioners were markedly gifted and

On the contrary, the creation of a new country

created works of sensitivity and craftsmanship.

offered a lot of opportunities for those artists

Zainul Abedin, The Rebel Cow, Water Color, 1966 Image Courtesy: Bengal Foundation Bangladesh

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who were among the first —in the 1950s—to

The people’s upsurge of 1968-69 against the

emerge from the art institute in Dhaka, to go

military dictatorship changed the situation and

abroad and have a firsthand experience of the

artists came forward to depicit the people’s

art world of the West. The 1950s gave way to

aspirations in banners, posters, festoons,

the 1960s, a time when the overwhelming trend

caricatures and murals; many of them looked

in mainstream western art was abstraction

for inspirations from indigenous folk-art and

of various sorts. In the meantime, military

culture. There was a return to figurative

dictatorship had a firm grip on the country

expression predicated on an urge to comment

and this gave our artists a suitable opportunity

on the political and social situation. Artists

to escape the controversy over the identity of

played a vital role in the liberation war of 1971

heritage and to become ‘international’ by using

by glorifying national heritage and identity

a ‘universal’ artistic language like abstraction.

through propaganda and promotional art.

It did help that abstraction confomred with

Post-liberation, the art scene saw a renewed

the basic concepts of non-configuration in

pledge to depict the aspirations of a new

Islam and did not annoy Pakistan’s military

nation in multifarious manifestations. There

rulers. Thus the artists of the 1950s and 1960s

was a great enthusiasm in the art arena and

initiated a major shift of attitudes in art via the

the younger generation started working

introduction and appreciation of abstraction;

with diverse materials and in diverse idioms.

this has remained a major tendency in the

Students went for higher training not only

visual arts and is still considered by many as

to the western capitals, but also to eastern

the ‘ultimate’ and most progressive form of

centres such as India, Japan and China. This

art language. The non-configuration practiced

brought in variations in style, technique and

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material. But matters took a reverse turn

tradition, identity and modernity with a more

abstract, semi-abstract and so-called ‘folk’ decorative

shortly after the country, again, came under

objective and dispassionate viewpoint, and

works, and are dominating the consumer market.

long tenures of autocratic rule in various

are more concerned with issues of language,

Newspapers, journals and mainstream critics are also

guises. Once again, the question of identity

articulation and expression. Their sources of

promoting the same. A non-conformist artist has to

came to the fore; religious affiliations, too,

inspiration are truly global; they are trying

confront all these and continue to ply her craft in not

were highlighted. Though a sort of democracy

to give expression to their ideas in diverse

too congenial an environment. Nevertheless, a good

prevails at the moment elections are held

modes such as installation, light, sound and

number of young artists are working and displaying a

– and the last one was quite fair and free –

performances. One distinctive feature through

keen sense of contemporariness. They are negotiating

communal sentiments are gaining momentum.

the 1980s and 1990s is that many women have

issues like identity and tradition with a more objective

The effect of all this is that there exists a

emerged as serious artists, addressing issues

understanding, and they are attempting to address

sense of dejection and despair among artists.

such as the persecution of women and children,

more relevant national and international issues such as

Many of them, as before, have reverted to

the environment, communalism and social

globalisation, consumerism, feminism, environment,

abstraction as an escape from the dilemma.

discrimination, in more effective imageries than

and economic and social discrimination.

their male counterparts. However, the choices At the same time, the world hasn’t stood still.

for a committed artist remain difficult. The

Our art of the recent times reflects a society in

International art activities of the present times

restoration of democracy has not succeeded in

a formative turmoil. Its unstable and hesitant

have brought innovation to our doorstep.

restraining violence, corruption and terrorism.

characteristics

Artists are alive to multifarious dimensions

The entire society is affected and the individual

growth through a continous process of trial and

through exhibitions, films, printed material,

is increasingly feeling helpless and resigned.

error. Bangladeshi artists confront problems and

internet and satellite TV. It is therefore not

The art market, however small, is being

distractions like any artist of a third world country,

unusual that artists of the 1980s and 1990s

swallowed by dominant art dealers, galleries

where her/his identity and the relevance of her/his

looked, and are looking, at such matters as

and saleable artists, who produce mostly

creations are also threatened by a burden of Western

are

reflections

country’s

cultural conditioning. In this regard, a close rapport and interaction between the artists and art activists of third world countries could help the artist explore alternative ideas and concepts free of that burden— one among others – leading to a sense of belonging and contemporariness, ultimately a meaningful destination. Abul Mansur

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Quamrul Hasan, Linocut, 1974

Critic, Writer, Retired professor of History of Art

(Courtesy: Mahbubur Rahman &

Department, Chittagong University

Tayeba Lipi)

Essay written in 2001

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Kazi Abdul Baset, In the Death Bed oil on canvas, 50 x 43 cm, 1982 (Courtesy: Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy) Aminul Islam, water colour on paper, 1964 (Courtesy: Mahbubur Rahman & Tayeba Lipi)

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then and now : a brief historical examination of art in bangladesh ayesha sultana

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152

The key to the beginnings of modern art in

the Faculty of Fine Art, University of Dhaka,

direct influence on Bengal; after the partition,

The first band of students and teachers of the

Bangladesh is to be found in 1864, during the

became a meeting place, often serving as a

the fascination for folk art forms worked as

Faculty of Fine Arts formed a new generation

British Raj, when the Calcutta Government

catalyst from which art movements could be

an instrument against religious restrictions in

of artists. The renowned Mohammed Kibria,

School of Art was founded. Abanindranath

realised. It was an educational centre, but

art. Works produced during this period often

graduating from the Calcutta School of Art,

Tagore was a major figure in re-introducing

also a significant cultural hub. Shilpacharya

glorified the land and its rural subjects. In a

joined Faculty of Fine Arts as a teacher. These

ancient and Indian styles in art. The work drew

Zainul Abedin, as the first principal, and his

country of 68,000 villages, art has been the

artists had diverse forms of expression. Some

upon Ajanta and Mughal art but had Japanese

colleagues led the modern art movement in

way of life for a people for whom folk and

drew as much from heritage as from global

influences. Jamini Roy’s work also established

Bangladesh. Eighteen students enrolled in

indigenous cultural idioms still exist as a living

trends of that time. Aminul Islam’s significant

some important elements of Bangladesh art,

the first year, in three departments–Drawing

force.

contributions were in a semi-abstract mode,

outside the Bengal School.

and Painting, Communication Design and

simultaneously also in murals around many

Graphic Arts. Most of the later prominent and

One noted artist of the 1940s, who disappeared

places of Bangladesh. Hamidur Rahman,

At the juncture of the partition of the Indian

internationally known artists were students of

for more than 20 years only to re-emerge in

Abdul Kader, Nurul Islam, Shamsul Alam

subcontinent in 1947, some students from

the faculty. Artists travelling to countries such as

the 1980s, was S.M. Sultan, who often worked

and Imdad Hossain’s work, renegotiating

the Government School of Art, Calcutta –

Japan, China and India for study programmes

with natural dyes, depicting the peasantry as

modernism, mainly toggled between abstract

including Zainul Abedin, renowned for his

and research brought in new ideas, sometimes

muscular protagonists in his large canvases.

and

famine drawings and scroll series – moved from

acquiring a particular skill in a medium or

Themes of dissent and instability were also

others in the same generation like Abdur

Kolkata to establish an art school in Dhaka.

instituting a change in artistic sensibility.

heightened during the Language Movement of

Razzaque, Murtaja Baseer, Syed Jahangir,

the early 1950s, when the faculty and students

Kazi Abdul Baset, Debdas Chakraborty,

Safiuddin Ahmed, Quamrul Hassan, Shafiqul

semi-abstract

forms.

Predominantly,

Amin, Anwarul Haq, Habibullah Bahar and

Modern art of Bangladesh has been secular.

displayed festoons and illustrations as part of

Samarjit Roy Chowdhury, Abu Taher, Rashid

Khaja Shafique Ahmed joined him there.

The re-establishment of ancient mythology in

relevant political/social commentary.

Chowdhury and Qayyum Chowdhury have

The Dhaka Art College, known since 2008 as

Indian art during the time did not have much

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similar approaches, sometimes investigating

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the War of Liberation as well as the Bangladesh

well-known.In a male-dominated art scenario,

landscape. The work of Novera Ahmed needs

a significant number of female artists were

a special mention as a sculptor well-versed in

also becoming visible and were instrumental

practice during the 1950s, when female artists

in creating the idioms of art-making of the

were unheard of.

1970s and 1980s, raising voices on political, economic and environmental issues, especially

Before the War of Liberation, a number of

on social and gender discrimination.

prolific artists created their own particular language and mode of expression. This group

The 1980s revealed more connectivity and

includes Monirul Islam, Hashem Khan,

exposure to international trends, as opposed

Rafiqun Nabi, Mahmudul Haq, Abul Barq

to some artists in the 1940s and 1950s who

Alvi, Hamiduzzaman Khan and Anwar Jahan.

were traveling abroad principally for study.

Their artistic practices displayed a mastery

Prevailing artists tried to use traditional

of technical prowess, be it in printmaking

sensibilities in a more discerning way. There

were aspects of the absurd, grotesque and

illustrations

concentrating

social

commentary.

humour, a disintegration of

form. The

oppressive political framework of Bangladesh On 16 December 1971, Bangladesh was born.

became more difficult for artists, who began

During the time, a number of artists actively

to question notions of identity and freedom

participated in the nine-month long Liberation

of thought/expression, as a part of everyday

War. This was a period of revitalisation,

reality. A group of artists were shaped during

newfound confidence and creativity; a return

this time, consisting of the prominent artist/

to the figurative both in painting and sculpture

cartoonist Shishir Bhattacharjee as well as

and a rediscovery of tradition. The artists

Nisar Hossain, Dhali al Mamun, Habibur

from the 1970s started working with diverse

Rahman,

materials and in varied idioms.

Chaman and Saidul Haque. These artists

Dilara

Begum

Jolly,

Niloofar

were involved in activism while creating work A new band of young artists emerged with a

that signified various themes on socio-political

large number of printmakers and sculptors.

crises and instability.

Shahid Kabir, Abdus Shakoor, Kalidas Karmakar,

Chandra

The 1990s brought possibilities for the

Shekhar Dey, Alak Roy, Nazlee Laila Mansur,

interaction between art and technology, an

Kazi Ghiyas, Farida Zaman, Mohammad

increasing inclination towards using digital

Eunus, Shahabuddin, Tarun Ghosh, Ranjit

art and multimedia is clearly evident well

Das and Ruhul Amin Kajol are among the

into the twenty-first century. This offered

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Monsur-ul-Karim,

Niloofar Chaman Summer Song of Cicada (time line 1900-2010) Sound installation, 2008, exhibited at Drik Gallery, organised by Britto Arts Trust (courtesy: Mahbubur Rahman)

156

newer directions amongst sculptors who were moving away from the conventional choice of materials for the execution of their work. One exceptionally important figure is Mahbubur Rahman who, with his solid academic background and extensive international exposure, was experimenting since the early 1990s with performance, installation and video work, moving away from painting and sculpture. His relentless search for new idioms of expression, explored and challenged the boundaries of visual art. His large oeuvre of projects reshaped the Bangladesh art scene and continues to influence many practicing artists. Britto Arts Trust, the nation’s first artist-led, nonprofit organisation, has contributed significantly to the contemporary art of Bangladesh. Its journey to what it is

today, began in Dhaka in 2002 . It was conceived out of a compulsion that grew out of the need to communicate across local barriers and overcome limitations in the Bangladesh art scene. The core group consisted of Mahbubur Rahman, Shishir Bhattacharjee, Tayeba 1. Mahbubur Rahman

Begum Lipi, Salahuddin Khan Srabon, Imran Hossain

I was told to say these words,

Piplu and Kabir Ahmed Masum Chisty. The principle

glass fiber, cow/goat hide, sound, neon and metal cage Pavilion of Bangladesh, 54 Venice

practices, to make exchanges at home and abroad.

Biennale 2011

Britto played a role in what was a key moment in the

(Photo credit: Mahbubur Rahman)

history of contemporary Bangladeshi art, participating

2. Promotesh Das Pulak Echoed Moments in Time, Manipulated archival images

idea was to create a space to promote alternative art

in Parables: Pavilion of Bangladesh at the 54th International Art Exhibition, Venice Biennale 2011. The five artists, Imran Hossain Piplu, Kabir Ahmed Masum Chisty,

Pavilion of Bangladesh, 54 Venice

Mahbubur Rahman, Promotesh Das Pulak and Tayeba

Biennale 2011

Begum Lipi (who also took on the role as commissioner),

(Photo credit: Mahbubur Rahman)

had individualised art practices and shared experiences conducive to our times: a geological time-scale of war; the twenty-first century individual occupying the mythic

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Medusa’s role; social and religious taboos;

development and promotion of the visual arts.

personal interpretations of iconic Liberation

The Bengal Foundation, a private trust,

War imagery; notions of beauty and the

commenced its journey in the late 1980s

duality of feminine/masculine within us. of

Funded by a local business house, the

global visibility and exposure that it provided,

unfaltering personal vision of its chairman

which helped build a wider system of networks

Abul Khair Litu (a patron and collector of the

for contemporary art of Bangladesh.

arts) continues to play a pivotal role in sharing the richness of Bangladeshi culture: in music,

Britto has facilitated numerous large-scale

having released over a hundred albums

events and new media exhibitions. One of

of Bengali music; in theatre; in the visual

its significant and important projects was

arts; in organising frequent art events and

1mile² Dhaka that included artists, film makers,

workshops, seminars and musical soirees; and

photographers, researchers, all involved in

in publishing the international arts quarterly

a one month long event in Old Dhaka – a

Jamini and Kali O Kalam, an acclaimed Bengali

demarcated area and source of inspiration.

literary magazine. The Bengal Shilpalaya,

Another major milestone for Britto was to

of which the Bengal Gallery of Fine Arts

secure its own, permanent space that is far

and more recently the Bengal Art Lounge

from the notion of a conventional, white-cube

are a part of, was established in 2000 and

gallery. Non-commercial and flexible in nature,

has hosted over 200 exhibitions at home and

Britto Space takes on the idea of an adaptable

abroad. Abul Khair Litu’s Bengal Foundation

‘space’ that will expand and transform to

Art Repository is known to be the largest

realize numerous possibilities and regular

collection of modern and contemporary art

events such as workshops, seminars, artists-

in the country. Furthermore, this kind of art

in-residence programmes, performances and

advocacy was witnessed at the Dhaka Art

artist talks — a hub for contemporary art.

Summit 2011; as the largest hosted art event in

Entitled Space, the dynamic opening show of

Bangladesh, it provided a unique opportunity

Britto Space ran parallel with other exhibitions

to showcase the diversified art scene.

during the inauguration of the Dhaka Art Summit 2012 in April.

The founders of Samdani Art Foundation, Rajeeb and Nadia Samdani, organised the

Imran Hossain Piplu,

Over the years, a few other artist groups and

ambitious, large-scale event. It will continue,

The Utopian Museum,

organisations have developed such as the

annually, to foster and reflect upon a more

Santaran Art Organization and the Porapara

optimistic potential for the country’s inherent

Art Space in Chittagong; the Dhaka Art

cultural structure. The four-day event was a

Center, set up a few years ago, also seeks

collaboration between the National Museum

digital images, printed publication, wooden stools, glass fiber, pavilion of Bangladesh, 54 Venice Biennale 2011 (Photo credit: Mahbubur Rahman)

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and the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy, which

1. Kabir Ahmed Masum Chisty,

has been organising the Asian Art Biennale

Quandary,

since 1981. Nineteen core gallery booths and

60 second 2D animation and 100 key drawings,

220 artists around Bangladesh participated independently, with works of installation art,

Pavilion of Bangladesh, 54 Venice Biennale 2011 (Photo credit: Mahbubur Rahman)

painting, sculpture, photography, performance,

2. Tayeba Begum Lipi,

video art. An international audience ranging

Bizarre and The Beautiful,

from curators, gallerists, collectors, artists,

stainless steel made razor blades,

critics and auction house representatives were invited to a two-day art forum. Some of this exposure resulted in the culmination of Tayeba

270x254x77cm, pavilion of Bangladesh, 54 Venice Biennale 2011 (Photo credit: Mahbubur Rahman)

Begum Lipi’s stainless steel sculpture, Bizarre and the Beautiful II (exhibited at Space), being auctioned at Christie’s King Street, London, in June 2012 as part of their South Asian Modern and Contemporary Art initiative. It was a major

stepping stone for Bangladeshi art to be part of the world’s largest auction house, along with other contemporary and modern artists of the subcontinent. Countless

exhibitions

and

openings

private galleries (mostly Dhaka-centric) have strengthened the interest of visual arts in the public sphere. Exhibition spaces such as La Gallerie, Shilpangan, Chitrak, Drik, Gallery 21, Bengal Gallery of Fine Arts, Bengal Art Lounge and Gallery Kaya are some notable and established ones. The network built between artists at home and internationally, while participating in exhibitions and exchange programmes of residencies and workshops, strive to build a positive impact and potential to carve out new directions for the future.

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Ayesha Sultana Visual Artist Essay written in March 2012

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1. Shulekha Chaudhury Mirror, water, flower, clay toys, curtain, acrylic paint, Kabi Nazrul Hostel, Old Dhaka, 1Mile²

Dhaka by Britto (Photo Credit: Promotesh Das Pulak) 2. Kamruzzaman Shadhin Plastic bottles at Buriganga River, Sadarghat, 1Mile² Dhaka by Britto (Photo Credit: Kamruzzaman Shadhin) 3. Sanjida Shaheed Sunny 2.

Khobor Achhe, Shakhari Bazaar, 1Mile² Dhaka by Britto (Photo Credit: Promotesh Das Pulak) 4. Runa Islam, UK Be the first to see what you see as you see it, 16mm film, Britto New Media Festival, 2009 (Photo Credit: Manir Mrittik) 5. Cedric Maridet, France, Huangpu, Video and sound installation Britto New Media Festival, 2009

(Photo Credit: Manir Mrittik)

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Khandaker Nasir Ahammed Branches and Ropes Rangabali, Galachipa, Potuakhali, Prantiker Prakitajan 1, 2010, a series of workshops with ethnic groups (Photo credit: Mahbubur Rahman)

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extending and expanding the idea and space tayeba begum lipi

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168

At the beginning of this century we felt a great need to develop an alternative platform for artists – something that was completely missing in Bangladesh. At that time we felt that artists of our generation, but also those younger than us, were like outsiders in the local art scene for our work and interests did not fit in any of the existing categories. As a response, we decided to bring together a community of like-minded artists to develop ideas and projects, a considerable effort given an art scene that was fragmented and dominated by government-led activities. Quickly, the activities of the group were noticed and received greater demand for regularity. This required us to put together a working group of committed artists who gave life to Britto Arts Trust, the first non-profit and registered artist-run trust in Bangladesh. Its major undertaking at that time was the development of an international artists’ workshop, with plans starting to take shape in 2002 and the workshop occurring at the beginning of the following year, outside Dhaka. The workshop drew attention from the artist community in the country, signalling a need for a non-institutional framework in which artists could work and learn from each other, exchanging ideas and learning new methods. The participation of international artists strongly contributed to the dialogue and innovative approaches to art-making instigated at the workshop. Paolo W. Tamburella, Italy, Murgi Prasad, Panam Nagar, Sonargaon

While Britto has progressed enormously during its

Britto International Artists’ Workshop, 2010

existence, it has continued to remain an artist-led and

(Photo credit: Mahbubur Rahman)

run project. All the experiences and successes continue to support its original mission which was that of bringing artists together and, as an organisation, putting Britto and art from Bangladesh on the map of the world art

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scene. This was further confirmed by Britto’s

and a two month-long large-scale public art

involvement in creating mobility for artists,

project entitled 1 Mile, which took place in 19

bringing international artists to the country

different venues around old Dhaka, developed

but also sending Bangladeshi artists to work

in collaboration with Visiting Arts, UK. We

abroad, fulfilling a need for exchanges that

deliberately started to introduce new media

created a stronger local but internationally

such as video, sound, image manipulation and

informed and aware art scene.

animation in the Bangladeshi art scene. We want to continue to focus on these as the role

of technology in contemporary art continues

to answer the needs of our local community

to grow.

1. Yasmin Jahan Nupur

of artists. In addition, being in a network

Discovering Myself, Video and photography

enabled us to do things independently without

Amongst the various projects, Britto is

SPACE, an inaugural show at new space and

being alone. This is why being part of the

also developing Prantiker Prakitajan, an

South Asian Network for Artists (SANA) is so

ongoing art project started in 2009 involving

important for us, our programmes and our

ethnic communities living in remote areas

community. SANA, which is part of the world-

of Bangladesh. The project addresses the

wide Triangle Network, has strengthened

need to raise awareness amongst the wider

us and helped us develop a consistent series

Bangladeshi community about the lives and

of projects over the last few years. Both the

cultures of minority groups. This is an urgent

celebrating 10 years of Britto

regional and the international networks gave us

need that brings to the fore the needs and

BRITTO SPACE a contemporary art hub, 30

the confidence and track record that enabled

conditions of the various populations in our

March-15 April 2012

us to widen our horizons and develop our

country, and helps to re-frame the ideas of

(Photo credit: Tayeba Begum Lipi)

connections with the international art scene.

Bangladeshi identity and history. The success

celebrating 10 years of Britto BRITTO SPACE a contemporary art hub, 30 March-15 April 2012 (Photo Credit: Manir Mrittik) 2.

Being part of a network was a way for Britto

2. Shulekha Chaudhury and Ayesha Sultana at work for the Mural Project SPACE, an inaugural show at new space and

of the activities so far led us to plan a larger

3. View of the show SPACE , 2012 3.

An inaugural show at new space and celebrating

As a result, over the past 10 years, Britto has

project that focuses on communities living on

10 years of Britto

worked with a huge number of international

the border between Bangladesh and India.

Curated by Mahbubur Rahman

and local artists through numerous projects

This will be developed as a collaborative

(Photo Credit: Manir Mrittik)

that included four international workshops

project, involving artists from both countries

4. Maynul Islam Paul,

(organised biannually), several residencies with

working together in an area often deemed as

Matir Kotha, clay

local and international artists, five students’

‘no man’s land’.

alterations of Vessel Workshop’s outcome piece

residencies, many artist-led talks, projects,

SPACE, an inaugural show at new space and

events and workshops with local artists, a

In 2011, Britto represented Bangladesh at the

celebrating 10 years of Britto

series of video and sound workshops, a new

54th Venice Biennale. For us and Bangladesh

media festival with local and international

this was a major achievement, reflecting Britto’s

artists, a South Asian Artists Exhibition

mission to connect with the international art

BRITTO SPACE a contemporary art hub, 30 March-15 April 2012 4.

(Photo Credit: Promotesh Das Pulak)

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scene and to showcase Bangladeshi artists

the space useful through the involvement of

abroad. For the first time in the 116-year

local artists but also through exchanges with

history of the Venice Biennale, Bangladesh

international artists and organisations as well

had its national pavilion there. The ‘Road to

as curators, critics and researchers, so that we

Venice’ started with a video art exhibition by

can continue to develop ambitious projects.

Britto titled Videozoom Bangladesh, at Sala1, in

We have great hopes for Britto to become a

Rome in 2010, which introduced the idea. We

resource and research facility for the next

soon submitted an application to the Biennale

generation of artists and researchers.

committee and started collaborating with the Bengal Foundation, Bangladesh, and the

Britto is not alone in the local art scene any

Gervasuti Foundation in Venice. Following

more. What started as a small but ambitious

this, we received support from the Ministry of

project in 2002 has provided an inspiration

Foreign Affairs of Bangladesh and the Embassy

to other artist groups in our country. New

of Bangladesh in Rome. We were also strongly

alternative platforms have emerged and

supported by the Embassy of Italy in Dhaka

developed their own spaces, ideas and

that, in collaboration with Bengal Gallery,

directions, creating new possibilities and great

hosted a fundraising exhibition with almost

ambitions for artists in Bangladesh to develop

100 paintings from local artists at the residence

their practice and play a part in both the local

of the Italian Ambassador. Arts Collaboratory,

and international art community.

the Prince Claus Fund from the Netherlands and many others provided valuable support to

Tayeba Begum Lipi

make the project a success.

Visual Artist, Co-Founder and Trustee Britto Arts Trust

At the moment Britto is working on its new

Essay written in February 2012

space in Dhaka. This is a dream come true for us and is the result of years of savings and donations from coordinators, a grant from Arts Collaboratory and loans from Robert Loder, co-founder of Triangle Network and Mahbubur Rahman, artist and co-founder

Mahbubur Rahman

of Britto. The space was acquired in March

Alternating Gesture, video installation

2011, giving Britto a permanent hub for the production and exhibition of challenging, non-commercial and experimental art in Bangladesh. We are looking forward to making

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SPACE, an inaugural show at new space and celebrating 10 years of Britto BRITTO SPACE a contemporary art hub, 30 March-15 April 2012 (Photo Credit: Manir Mrittik)

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1. Village theatre by HAJONG community Prantiker Prakitajan 4 at Bipinganj, Durgapur, 2011

(Photo credit: Mahbubur Rahman) 2. Promotesh Das Pulak, Harano Sur, manipulated images, frames and flowers, Panam Nagar, Sonargaon Britto International Artists’ Workshop 2010 (Photo Credit: Promotesh Das Pulak) 3. ‘Overlapping’, a two month long project by Britto members

at BRITTO SPACE, 2012

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TIMELINE

regimes in a UN speech, prompting Pakistani

of devastating floods that caused extensive

The caretaker government embarked on a

leader General Musharraf to cancel talks with

damage to agriculture and infrastructure.

mission, popularly known as the ‘Minus Two

her.

Militant

1997

Relations between Bangladesh and Pakistan

International

A peace accord is signed between the government

strained further after a row over a leaked Pakistani

(IKNM), besiege several Ahmadiyya mosques

of Bangladesh and the 13 tribes of the Chittagong

report on the 1971 war of independence.

countrywide.

Islamists,

under

Khatme

the

Nabuyat

Formula’, to rid the country of the battling

Movement

begums — Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina

banner

2009

In a landmark decision, the Parliamentary

Hill Tracts, ending 22 years of fighting.

Wajid.

2005

Bangladeshi authorities establish new electoral

More than 1.5 million people in Bangladesh

Standing Committee on the Ministry of Defence,

were rendered homeless and many killed when

Bangladesh, recommended the revocation of the

On the morning of August 17, Bangladesh is

rules which, among other reforms, mandate that

a cyclone struck the southeastern region of the

1981 court-martial judgment against 37 army

shaken as more than 500 bombs go off within a

political parties register to take part in elections

country.

officers, 13 of whom had been hanged, in the

co-ordinated span of half an hour in 63 of the

and that voters can reject all proposed candidates

assassination of Mujib ur Rehman.

country’s 64 districts.

and select a ‘no vote’ option.

At every bomb location, leaflets are recovered

Bangladesh begins a massive crackdown against undocumented Rohingya tribals.

The

1996

treaty,

establishing

30-year

water-sharing arrangement and recognizing Bangladesh’s rights as a lower-level riparian state,

2001

belonging to a banned Islamic militant group,

comes into force.

Relations between Bangladesh and India take a

Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB). 2010

turn for the worse due to border skirmishes. 1998 Fifteen former army officers are sentenced to death for involvement in the assassination of

2002 Government of Bangladesh introduces death

2006

Border guards in the Bangladesh Rifles, a

Grameen Bank of Bangladesh and its founder,

paramilitary security force, mutiny in Dhaka

Muhammad Yunus, jointly awarded the Nobel

allegedly due to dismal pay and living conditions;

President Mujib ur Rahman.

penalty for acid attacks amid public anger over

Peace Prize.

74 soldiers are killed, amongst them 54 senior

Taslima Nasreen returns to Bangladesh only to

escalating violence against women.

A little-known village in the north of Bangladesh,

military officers.

be hounded out by renewed death threats.

Operation

Rohingyas

Kansat, erupts in violence as thousands of people

The mutineers agree to lay down their arms and

About two-third of the Bangladesh is covered

refugees from villages and forces them to move to

take to the street, demanding regular power

accept an amnesty offered by the government.

by the water of the Brahmaputra, the Ganga

a makeshift camp called Tal.

supply and an end to corruption by power-

Later, amnesty is rescinded for those directly

company authorities.

responsible for the killings and a special tribunal

Thousands of labourers in the ready-made

is created to handle the prosecutions.

For the third year in a row, Bangladesh ranks

garment industry — one of the most competitive

In a ruling on the decades-old dispute between

1999

at the top of Transparency International’s list of

in the world because of low labour costs — fill

two main political parties, the High Court of

The government of Bangladesh attempts to buy

most corrupt countries.

the streets of Dhaka, demanding a raise in wages

Bangladesh decided it was the father of PM

eight Russian MiG-29 jet fighters at a cost of

The general political atmosphere of the country

and the payment of back wages; the agitation

Sheikh Hasina, and not late husband of her arch-

$124 million, with no clear reasons given for such

continues to worsen, with the relationship

lasts a month.

rival Khaleda Zia, who proclaimed independence

an expensive military purchase, leading to public

between

outrage.

deteriorating further.

Clean

Heart

evicts

and the Meghna, in one of the most destructive flooding events in modern world history.

2000 Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina criticizes military

177

2003

ruling

and

opposition

from Pakistan in 1971.

parties

2004 Bangladesh’s economy strained by five months

2007

Facebook is blocked for a few weeks for

President Iajuddin Ahmed declares a state of

‘blasphemous content’. The ban is lifted after the

emergency in Bangladesh amid violence in the

website promised to make material considered

election run-up and postpones polls.

derogatory inaccessible to users.

178

Bangladesh sets up a special war crimes tribunal

Bangladesh turns away and bans aid to thousands

to try suspects accused of murder, torture, rape,

of displaced Rohingya people trying to cross over

arson, and treason during its 1971 independence

from Myanmar; they were fleeing persecution by

war.

Rakhine mobs.

Execution

five

former

army

officers,

condemned for the murder of Sheikh Mujib ur Rahman, is carried out. In a ruling welcomed by environmentalists, Bangladesh’s high court ban the lease of coastal land to toxic, ship-breaking yards. 2011 The Bangladesh Parliament pass a crucial amendment to the Constitution, scrapping the caretaker government system for holding polls and restoring secularism; Islam remains the state religion. Bangladesh and India reach an agreement on enclaves or chitmahals, areas where one country’s territory is surrounded by the other, whereby enclave residents can continue residing where they were or move to the country of their choice. Government orders the removal of Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus from his post as head of the microfinance bank, Grameen, a humiliating blow for an activist whose revolutionary idea of giving out small loans lifted many out of poverty. 2012 Key figures from the Islamist party Jamaat-eIslami, including leader Motiur Rahman Nizami, are charged with war crimes by a government tribunal of Bangladesh investigating alleged collaboration with Pakistan during the 1971 independence struggle.

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www.vaslart.org

www.theertha.org

www.brittoartstrust.org

www.khojworkshop.org

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