It has been a few years now since i started my journey of appreciating art and in the process have been walking up and down galleries and museums across the country, trying to catch up with shows, and training my eyes on what's on show and trying to figure out a taste for discerning what makes an impact and trying to articulate the what and why of the impacts. In recent times there has been a growing desire to see something breaking through, and there comes this evening when a group show, called Poka Yoke by NWNS group, opened in Chennai that cries in one loud voice to the art world in Chennai, to stop and take notice.
NWNS ( New Works for New Systems) is an eclectic group of Indian artists based in different parts of the world from Berlin,to London, to Mumbai and Chennai and working with different mediums. This eclectism gives the group a definite edge. These are artists that have their pulse tuned to the Precessions in the world art scenario, and in the process have created art that are at the threshold and pushing the boundaries. This show is called Poka Yoke, in an antithetical play on the Japanese word referring to the practice of mistake proofing in an assembly line, and driving home the impossibility of a singular art experience.
As one walks into the Labernum gallery at Cholamandal, one is easily lured to walking straight and taking a closer look at Ganapathy Subramaniam's five Prints of generative art, that from a distance look like musical notations, but on closer look reveal the glee and ecstasy of an artist who has just discovered the ideal convergence of his training in Computer programming and his art aesthetics cravings. GS has devised computer programs that will wield the brush and make the strokes for him. Through a few commands he decides on the depth, timbre, hue , etc of the strokes.
This generative art, rightly called so, for the artist is driven by a certain melody, contemplates a certain set of stokes and these are simulated on to the program, that in turn generates this series of Melodic fragments. Understandably one is excited by the thought that, what is on display is only the tip of the iceberg, the opening glimpses of a grand Philharmonc orchestra that's in the making.
Vasundhara Sellamuthu's video instalation, 'Name on rice' looks deceptively simple, but offers a deeply moving and immersive experience at very different levels. At one level its a visual take on the traditional serving of meals on a Plantain leaf on the occassion of marriages in Tamilnadu as a pallete of colours, it zooms in on the food served to give us a sense of their porus, globular shapes, and it is also a reflective exercise on the tactility of the food and the discography between the fingers and the food served. The mangala music , that forms the background to any marriage occasion, accompanies the video and gives it a transportative effect. The work is an intelligent play on the physical and cultural conditioning of a population. It would be interesting to know how a viewer alien to the Tamil culture would engage with this video.
Al- Qawi Nanavati's 'letters to my Mother' is grief-itti on wall, a mosaic of stick slips with letters inscribed like calligraphy and love stitched on to it, symbolic of tears and prayer threads. It's a meditation on the loss of the artist's mother, in which the artist invites us join her in her prayers for lessening of her grief. This work is formidable in what it achieves on the sidelines of it's purported role in the show. Firstly, it invites the audience to participate in the work in an active physical, spiritual and aesthetic way than any work can possibly aspire to. And secondly it questions the idea of permanency and temporality of the art work by bringing on itself a process of gradual self destruction/ transformation. It would be an interesting exercise to capture on video how viewers interact with the work and how it transforms over the time.
Arvind Sundar's exhibits aspire to bring together his fascination with the possiblities of the Grid pattern, experimenting with material and creating new geometric shapes. His works bring together on the one hand the raw,porous, patterned, and natural Jute and embeds upon it a skin of fabricated and smooth coloured plaster. He has worked this combination up by experimenting with colours and shapes of the plastered skin, offering an array of patterns and tactile icons.
Aruna Samivelu's works appear rich in process and intervention but somehow failed to engage with the me, probably because of the size or positioning of the works.
The group NWNS stands apart in it's embrace of the technology and striving to make a difference by playing around with the art process. The show also stands tall in it's coherent alignment to a novel curatorial idea and a well chiseled curatorial note that is integral to the show.
The show is buzzing with a lot of Potential and in it's situation in the hallowed grounds of Cholamandal, makes a loud statement offering new and exciting directions to art in Chennai.
NWNS ( New Works for New Systems) is an eclectic group of Indian artists based in different parts of the world from Berlin,to London, to Mumbai and Chennai and working with different mediums. This eclectism gives the group a definite edge. These are artists that have their pulse tuned to the Precessions in the world art scenario, and in the process have created art that are at the threshold and pushing the boundaries. This show is called Poka Yoke, in an antithetical play on the Japanese word referring to the practice of mistake proofing in an assembly line, and driving home the impossibility of a singular art experience.
As one walks into the Labernum gallery at Cholamandal, one is easily lured to walking straight and taking a closer look at Ganapathy Subramaniam's five Prints of generative art, that from a distance look like musical notations, but on closer look reveal the glee and ecstasy of an artist who has just discovered the ideal convergence of his training in Computer programming and his art aesthetics cravings. GS has devised computer programs that will wield the brush and make the strokes for him. Through a few commands he decides on the depth, timbre, hue , etc of the strokes.
This generative art, rightly called so, for the artist is driven by a certain melody, contemplates a certain set of stokes and these are simulated on to the program, that in turn generates this series of Melodic fragments. Understandably one is excited by the thought that, what is on display is only the tip of the iceberg, the opening glimpses of a grand Philharmonc orchestra that's in the making.
Vasundhara Sellamuthu's video instalation, 'Name on rice' looks deceptively simple, but offers a deeply moving and immersive experience at very different levels. At one level its a visual take on the traditional serving of meals on a Plantain leaf on the occassion of marriages in Tamilnadu as a pallete of colours, it zooms in on the food served to give us a sense of their porus, globular shapes, and it is also a reflective exercise on the tactility of the food and the discography between the fingers and the food served. The mangala music , that forms the background to any marriage occasion, accompanies the video and gives it a transportative effect. The work is an intelligent play on the physical and cultural conditioning of a population. It would be interesting to know how a viewer alien to the Tamil culture would engage with this video.
Al- Qawi Nanavati's 'letters to my Mother' is grief-itti on wall, a mosaic of stick slips with letters inscribed like calligraphy and love stitched on to it, symbolic of tears and prayer threads. It's a meditation on the loss of the artist's mother, in which the artist invites us join her in her prayers for lessening of her grief. This work is formidable in what it achieves on the sidelines of it's purported role in the show. Firstly, it invites the audience to participate in the work in an active physical, spiritual and aesthetic way than any work can possibly aspire to. And secondly it questions the idea of permanency and temporality of the art work by bringing on itself a process of gradual self destruction/ transformation. It would be an interesting exercise to capture on video how viewers interact with the work and how it transforms over the time.
Sujeeth Kumar's decision to show the palette sheet By-product alongside his figurative painting, offers the viewer a chance to savour these artifacts that are usually discarded by the artist. It is understandable that Sujeeth has had to actively fight the devils of self doubts in putting these on display, for he is earnestly worried that his very decision to put these on display interferes with his painting process and makes him more conscious of what goes into the palette sheet. The Landscape he aspires to capture in 'Chaging seasons' is a very fascinating idea and an ambitious one. However he has had to settle for a domestically simulated process. It would be interesting to see what the idea looks like when executed in actual conditions.
Arvind Sundar's exhibits aspire to bring together his fascination with the possiblities of the Grid pattern, experimenting with material and creating new geometric shapes. His works bring together on the one hand the raw,porous, patterned, and natural Jute and embeds upon it a skin of fabricated and smooth coloured plaster. He has worked this combination up by experimenting with colours and shapes of the plastered skin, offering an array of patterns and tactile icons.
Aruna Samivelu's works appear rich in process and intervention but somehow failed to engage with the me, probably because of the size or positioning of the works.
The group NWNS stands apart in it's embrace of the technology and striving to make a difference by playing around with the art process. The show also stands tall in it's coherent alignment to a novel curatorial idea and a well chiseled curatorial note that is integral to the show.
The show is buzzing with a lot of Potential and in it's situation in the hallowed grounds of Cholamandal, makes a loud statement offering new and exciting directions to art in Chennai.
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