A Conversation with Abhishek Kashyap
Abhishek Kashyap
How were you inclined towards art or painting?
There were no artists in my family. But I vividly remember that since I became old enough to sense the world ‘Amrit bazaar patrika’ used to be a part of our household because my father’s background had been socialist-communist. He had been to Kolkata University to study journalism, though he did not complete the course.
During those times the newspaper (Amrit bazaar patrika) would arrive a day later at our house. Paper would come from Kolkata on train so we used to get today’s paper the following morning. I used to read the articles on art and artists published in it. There was an English magazine too being published by ‘Amrit bazaar’ group in which illustrations were published. Drawings and paintings published in it attracted me but I did not have much understanding of art by then. But gradually as I read more and more of these articles on art published in ‘Amrit bazaar’ I became aware of art and music. And then when I came to Delhi and started reading Hindi I realized that almost all the matter published in Hindi about art was very superficial. It meant that there used to be some information about the artist and his photo and that was considered enough to write about any form of art. In all the articles written about my work I never felt that whatever I had been trying to say through my art and had not been able to say, was ever mentioned in them. For example why is my work devoid of women? No critic had ever raised this question. Nor did anyone made me aware about this fact. If an artist is not painting any woman in his paintings, it is indeed an important issue. If some critic had written about it, it would not have taken me 20 years to answer this.
In many of your paintings ‘scaffolding’ has probably come out as a symbol of continuous urbanization due to which a concrete jungle can be seen all around…
‘Scaffolding’ came into my paintings for the first time in 1999. In building construction ‘scaffolding’ made of iron pipes is temporary as we all know. After the completion of construction it is removed. ‘Scaffolding’ is a support system, which if not done properly may result in the collapse of the whole structure. Today in our country large buildings are erected on the name of development, concrete jungles can be seen everywhere. ‘Scaffolding’ is the metaphor for this unplanned and imbalanced development on the cost of environment, nature, life and humane values. This gives out the message that by negating the support system of ecology and nature, the kind of development we are engaged in right now, this structure can collapse any time! On the other hand ‘scaffolding’ in my paintings are symbol of uncertainty of urban life as well.
Especially in the last 20-25 years the way the jungles are diminishing, agriculture lands are fast turning into concrete jungles, this is a worrisome trend. In this studio where we are sitting right now, this place used to be an agricultural farm till 2010. 2-4 peacocks can still be seen here. Just think how many more peacocks would have been here earlier and the biodiversity this place had back then.
Yes, in addition to ‘scaffolding’ in your paintings one can also see helpless and desperate birds, cats, cows too in barren environment, amidst dirt ridden smoke…
Under present conditions they exist as mute witnesses in my paintings. In comparison to humans; birds and animals get to know about the natural calamities before they actually happen. Like rats run away before the earthquake hits, dogs begin to bark….. in my paintings these animals are the witnesses and mute spectators of natural calamities created out of the greed and blind competition of humans for the so called development.
Are you in favour of an artist’s active social role ?
See, I have seen many artists saying—- “I am very sensitive about that or this issue.” but then in your art and paintings no one can see any sensitivity about that issue. Do you not have any social responsibility as an artist?
I am not anti-development, but there should be some limitation, some balance. Is it not necessary to stop and think about the cost at which this development is happening? Farmers are committing suicide, animals and birds are dying; lions, leopards, elephants are becoming extinct…. As artists should we not raise our collective voice against this?
As an artist I have the access to the ‘politics of aesthetics’, why should I not use it? I use ‘politics of aesthetics’ as a tool. Urbanization has not only affected environment, it has also adversely affected human relationships and values too. I try to understand this process. There are a lot many questions whose answers are still evading me.
But you will agree that artists’ role is different from that of a political leader or a social activist ?
Absolutely. My take is that an artist should become neither a social activist nor a political leader. You see, the canvas an artist paints on is made of cotton. Today cotton farmers of Maharashtra are committing suicide each day. If you are not disturbed by their suicides, how can you be an artist?
Balbir Singh Kat had said— “if you can not carve a stone then do not destroy it at least.” I will add to it that if your art is not doing any good then what is the need to create it? Bad painting too is a kind of pollution. It doesn’t mean that it is not selling in the market. For that matter everything is being sold in the market.
I have no doubt about the fact that art is for the society. If my painting is restricted to some house or office’s decoration then I will prefer not to paint. that’s the reason I do not do commission work.
As you have mentioned social responsibility of an artist, has any of your painting or art work actually made a mark on that account ?
I have made a video– “story of a landscape”.in fact I wanted to do something new. I thought I should do something which fulfils my social responsibility as an artist as well as provides me aesthetic pleasure. In this video a man is taking pictures. While taking pictures he finds that the river is drying up. A conch is blown, it may mean anything… it may mean that the war has begun or it may mean that the war has ended. After this sound the blue sky turns black. All water animals die, river dries completely, it turns into quagmire. Black ants come out of it and takes over the whole environment. After ‘One drop foundation’ saw this they decided to show it in each village of Odisha. After many months I met a man in south Odisha. He told me that the video was shown in his village and everyone was very impressed, especially the kids. For many days children ran a cleanliness and water saving drive in the village. A German artist after watching this video told me that this is ‘heart heating’ video.
I mean to say that one can aesthetically use art for social concerns. For this every artist should be prepared to chose the right kind of medium and be able to address it’s challenges.
I don’t know if it’s intentional or automatic but in your earlier paintings one can see the influence of miniature paintings.
Not only in earlier ones, you can see miniature influence in my recent paintings too.
My question is how does an artist gets influenced by the tradition and in what form does it come at different points of time?
See, every artist has his own way and perception about tradition and their own style of getting influenced by tradition. There was a time when you would not get cigarette in India. When paper was invented, English came to India, trade began, cigarette became available in India. In earlier days there was no filter in cigarettes. And before that we used to roll tobacco in ‘tendu’ leaves and smoke.
I mean to say that as an artist I do not see tradition simply in terms of art and culture. From ‘beedee’ we graduated to cigarette. It’s become like a cigarette culture. So now we have two parallel traditions. Then the English created such an environment in the market that those who are affluent and civilized smoke cigarette and are better off than those who smoke ‘beedee’. And many sponsored reasons were added to this argument. Filter was added to the cigarette, many flavours and brands were brought in the market. Parallel to this you could smoke half a ‘beedee’ and throw it since it is very cheap. So ‘beedee’ is our tradition. If smoking pipe is a tradition in Cuba then why can’t we stick to our tradition of ‘beedee’ smoking? If we see Fidel Castro in a picture smoking a pipe we immediately comment that it is Cuban cigar. In the same way when we look at miniature painting we recognize it as mughal miniature or Punjab hills miniature. Similarly are food traditions; this is Odiya food, this is Rajasthani etc. the influence of tradition is not only in art, it is prevalent in food, textile, life style too, in fact in every aspect of our lives.
If I talk about myself then I must say that I grew up in a land where after the independence of India Nehru’s efforts kick-started industrial revolution. Heerakut dam is hardly three kilometre’s distance from my home town of Burla. Burla city was established for Heerakut dam. Due to this dam thousands of villagers were dislocated, hundreds of villages drowned, which was an unfortunate chapter of development. I call it a disaster.
To build the dam they needed experts, engineers and labours. So people came to Burla from all over the country. Some experts came from abroad too and gradually Burla developed as a cosmopolitan city. The city dwellers of this cosmopolitan city needed education and medical facilities, so medical and engineering colleges came up and later Sambhalpur University came into existence. All this is within the perimeter of 5-6 kilometres of my house. So in my childhood I saw a trend tracks type of thing passing along side my house. Later I came to know that it was built to bring supplies for the dam. So if you see my earlier work, water colours of my college time, you will see the glimpses of an industrial town, it is part of my subconscious like nostalgia. You talk about the influence of tradition so I must tell you I was born in western Odisha, but for my education, M.A. and B.F.A. I went to eastern Odisha. Here I got connected with another from of art— ‘patchitr’. I will stress on this fact that no research has been done on this so far, neither had been anything written that in western Odisha too there was a magical tradition of drawing style which has now become extinct due to lack of preservation.
What was that style called ?
It was called ‘patchitr’. You can call it Sambhalpuri patchitr. For this the canvas was made with used ‘dhoti’ so it used to be very soft. It was dipped in water and then glue was added to make the canvas. Basically it was a traditional canvas on which painting was done. As I have told you earlier too that it has now become extinct due to lack of any patronage. But in the eastern part along the sea coast line this art survived because the temple of Jagannath is there, the temple of Lingraj is there. Tourists throng here. Whenever anyone visits here they want to carry at least one sculpture or picture of the God with them. But earlier the technique of making bronze or brass or cast was not there so sculptures were mad out of stone, wood or paintings were made on canvas called ‘patchitr’. In all these ‘patchitr’ was the easiest, you paint it on a piece of old paper or cloth and keep it rolled away. I mean to say that because of the tourists the tradition of ‘patchitr’ survived here and flourished too. But in Sambhalpur it was finished. Later when I re-visited and tried to find I found many artists and old pieces too. That is raw from of ‘patchitr’ and is very beautiful, because it is not classified yet, it is not confined to any form as yet. Take the example of Madhubani painting. If you see Madhubani of 25 years earlier and that of today. Then you will find enormous difference between them. Now Madhubani painting is institutionalized. When any art from is institutionalized, it’s natural attraction and self-energy gets lost in that process.
Yes, the way you look at the jungle and a landscaped garden.
Absolutely. So just like Madhubani many traditional art form have turned into landscaped gardens…. Anyway! I had been seeing ‘patchitr’ since my childhood so it’s influence in my art was necessary. And then when I started to study history of Indian art, saw miniature paintings— mughal miniature, Sikh miniature, Rajasthani miniature, Kaangra miniature… I was introduced to another world. Detailing in mughal miniature is awesome. The king is going, hunting, clouds in the sky, birds are flying. Not even the king and the horse but the clouds in the sky and the bird’s wings too are immaculately painted. Be it the beard of the king or the peacock sitting in the front, each and every feather of that peacock is painted with such care and beauty. You will be mesmerized to see such detail on such a small surface.
You see, if some western painter paints the peepal tree, he will give an impression of it but in a miniature, painter will paint each and every leaf individually on the canvas. In our miniatures photo realism is not that important but the emotion is very important. So conscious, subconscious; in whichever way this tradition will be helpful for us in the times to come. Whatever are we painting today is just the extension of the past.