Chinartree

‘A critic’s job is to explore the creations of a painter.’ Excerpts from a discussion with Subhash Awchat - September 2008

 

A former student of JJ School of art, a professor at Pune College, an artist whose career has spanned four decades, a published writer and poet, Subhash Awchat is above all things a wonderful human being to spend time with. 

I had the pleasure of meeting ‘kaka’ on his brief visit to Dubai for the charity event ‘Khushi’ and discussed several issues surrounding the Indian art scene.  One of the most interesting topics of discussion was Indian art infrastructure.  The following are excerpts from our discussion.

Authentication

Subhash Awchat: In India, there is no infrastructure in art on any level.  No art insurance, no justice when art is duplicated or when any form of fraud occurs.  You can’t legally complain about these matters because there are no departments in existence that can help you with this matter - not in the police, not in the insurance companies, nor in the country.
It’s a very simple yet vital matter: art authentication.  Who authenticates paintings or works in India?  No one.

ChinarTree: I once had to fly to Bombay to meet a respected gallery owner just to authenticate a master’s work.  There was no other way of doing so it seemed.

SA: Exactly. That is unfortunately the only way to try and authenticate a painting.  Suppose you want to buy a Jamini Roy.  Is it enough that the gallery you’re buying from says it’s real? And what is the gallery owner’s qualifications to authenticate the work?

Infrastructure such as art insurance, copyright and authentication should be available in India considering how popular and important Indian contributions to contemporary art have become.  These assurances should be as easily available as commodities like anywhere else in the world, but they simply aren’t.

Corruption during the art boom

SA: If there is rivalry between art galleries, it should be in a healthy spirit.  It should not be that certain contemporary artists are promoted above others because of ‘groupism’ or because of rivalries. Unfortunately, this kind of politics exists and it is very sad for Indian art overall.  This, as far as I’m concerned, is a corruption of the system. 

During the initial boom of Indian art (2000-2005), a lot of work was bought at an inflated price and are now of course, those prices have fallen.  In a way, both artists and investors were swindled in the process. 

How it all started was that investors got fed up with putting money into property and gold and so turned their attentions to art.  But many did this without knowing anything about it and essentially ended up as traders in art, rather than informed collectors.

A widespread practice was that investors or ‘collectors’ caught hold of very young painters and offer them crores of rupees for 60 or 70 paintings.  After this, the investors or the gallerists put these works up for auction and falsely increased their value, thus making a profit on what they sold. 

When the bubble on Indian art burst in 2007, suddenly no one was interested in these young artist’s works.  So who suffered in the end?  The artists. 

Art may be a business, but it should also be conducted in a dignified manner. After all you’re not selling Colgate toothpaste!  There should be rules, norms and boundaries that specialists or authorities maintain.  Even though there is money involved, art is still a cultured business and shouldn’t be reduced to the principals of a mere stock market. 

Documentation

SA: I am on the Advisory Board of a publishing firm owned by Harsha Bhatkal, a friend of mine who is soon to be opening up a gallery in Mumbai.  I have advised him that the publication of more books on Indian art is of paramount importance to Indian art and its infrastructure.  We need more editors working in this area because it will lead to the creation of an informed guide for artists and collectors in India.

Documentation is the most important thing.  So many painters have died and still not had their works properly documented.  In sculpture, documentation is ever more scarce. This is a very serious issue and looking at Indian art history over the last 50 years, a lot more needs to be done in this regard.

CT: But I believe there are some art galleries in Bombay and Delhi that are publishing books on this subject?

SA: Yes but what about their content?  Just by taking a few photographs of an artist’s work and writing a few lines about his life is not enough. 

We need the correct analysis of the painter: what is his style? What was the period in which he painted and what was his response to the trends or influences in that time? What were his contemporaries doing and how does he stand against them?  These are the questions publishers of books on art should be asking, not simply churning out catalogues to make us all feel good.

Intellectual Property and Copyright

SA: People in India have a lot to learn about intellectual property and copyright. Let me illustrate this point with my own experiences. 

A few years ago, I secured a solo show.  I had waited four years for it to come to fruition.  In that time I was experimental in my work; my subjects had changed and I feel I had progressed as an artist.  So in this show, I exhibited works of a new theme compared to any of my previous work.

Less than two weeks later, I saw the same exact paintings I had done being replicated and sold elsewhere.  I was disgusted.  I have an intellectual property right over these works, the style and the subjects.  I had worked through a period of time to develop a body of work that was entirely of my own inspiration and creation, but who was going to protect it. 

There are no legal protections for artists, nor any copyright laws that we can turn to under such circumstances and this is something we need badly within Indian art.  We need to support artists in India or we risk losing out on our unique talents.
I have seen many young painters, who even make it to auction level, copying ideas.  This work is a kind of mass production, which is very sad and should be stopped.

Art Critics

SA: Alongside the boom in Indian contemporary art, we need education.  We need more art critics.  There are two or three magazines that have started the job, but this is still insufficient for the whole of Indian art.

A critic’s job is to explore the creations of a painter. They should evaluate the artist and his life and do justice to his art without bias and without consorting to a herd mentality on the subject. The few critics that do exist at the moment are biased. 

CT: In what way are they biased?

SA: They praise whatever show they cover, so they are biased. My question is, do these so-called critics have any knowledge of art?  Critics will see a student’s works and more often than not, praise them like they’re masters. Who decides whether an exhibition is good or bad? And when they write their critiques, who should we believe?

At the moment, if you have an opening, people will dress up and look more at each other than the paintings.  The subsequent evaluation of the show is based on whether the works get sold out or not!  If they’re sold out then the artist is good.  If not, then the artist is bad.

What we require is a system like in Europe or America.  Universities offer scholarships to young artists so they can afford to go and study painting in depth.  And you can actually learn to become a qualified art critic too!
This is something that is missing from the Indian scenario, or for that matter, the Asian one.  Exhibitions come and go, but where is the evaluation of the painter?  Where’s the  feedback and who is going to write about it? 

Criticism is something we should nurture in India because it’s just begun as a sort of discipline and the Indian art market is being recognized for its own merits as well.  My suggestion is that we need more books on the subject and qualified editors who will look at the subject more closely and give us informed opinions on what is what. 

We as consumers of art need to pay attention to writers who’ve really studied art and its language.  This is the level of informed criticism we need in India and as such, we need to fund more efforts in this direction.

After all, true critics are akin to the soul of art.