Technology as live vibrance

The multi-media event by Kevin Kelly (1 Shanthi Road Studio/Gallery, April 26 to 29) let one can hope again that exotic India is becoming obsolete.This mid-generation artist and assistant professor of art from Canada responded whole-heartedly to the reality of the country dominated by communication technology. His ‘Airsell’ exhibition took off from the omnipresence of mobile telephonic towers in and around the city. At first glance, the works seemed to act more in terms of a humorous as well as warm gesture of understanding and empathy rather than offer a profound experience. Still, they left a quite holistic and pervasive after-effect underscored by perceptive links with the wider ethos of the place on the grass-roots plane.

The most entertaining and spectacular component here was the racy, amusing video in which hosts of metallic tower grids with their antennas, receivers and such jutted out and jerkily shuttled between the ground and space to the accompaniment of raunchy film music. Somewhere on the edge of the camera real and animation, from the literal and the loud it drew a rough fantasy and poetry, while traces of popular cinema and TV commercials, like in life, coexisted with a sense of vibrant vitality. A connection with human bodies and sensations came through also from the partial graphic blur and rhythm of the computer-manipulated silhouettes.

The works that spoke about softly observing new technology against the changing modest-level traditional existence were the pieces done in collaboration with crafts people _ the black cloth hanging with motifs of towers boldly block-printed on them and the purple silk one embroidered in a more feminine manner with such designs threaded of small, shiny beads.

The most convincing aesthetically were the large, coarse-tender sketches of transmission machinery elements. As though tentative, they played on unfinished charcoal lines, sometimes replaced by shaped made from transparent cello-tape or torn strips of white paper. Through the residues of the realistic and of the nervous hand, there emerged a raw liveliness with an intuition of a forceful but chaotic, perhaps shabbily handled technology as being permeated by the humble yet spirited human condition.

Bengali duo

The latest presentation at Rightlines (April 18 to May 2), more interesting perhaps than usually, had works by two young artists from Bengal. The painter Tikendra Kumar Sahu brought large images combining opacity with a water colour-like translucence, this quality furthering the effect of a strange, hybrid permeability of objects, spaces and moods. Quite well brushed, even if slightly forced or elegant, the images allowed the viewer to expect something more profound from him in the future. The black and white woodcuts by Sataban Sarkar, appeared to allude to the early 20th century tradition of Kolkata but translate its rough, rhythmic expressiveness into an angry comment on contemporary social evils. Appreciating the artist’s passion and energy, one would however advise some restraint in the use of artificial frameworks around the basic images.

Layered sceneries

The solo exhibition by Sohini Dhar displayed by Mahua at the Leela Palace (April 25 to 28) collected instances of her familiar style with a new development. Among the former were long canvases in acrylic and pastels on paper with a vertical progression of somewhat overlapping landscape motifs in dark, dense colours. Hills, trees, buildings and patches of earth come there as a stepped but tight unfolding held and dictated by meandering pathways or streams. Their composition alludes to the flat, angled structure of old miniatures while carrying a memory of K G Subramanian. The new works _ pastels and mixed media on paper - offer an intimate closeness thanks to their small sizes, the light, delicate hues and the impact of collaged translucency. The miniature reference here relies on detail rendering. Although cultured and consummately done, both strands of the idiom remain just pleasant.

Faces

 ‘My Kingdom’, the exhibition by Babu Namboodiri K at Galerie Sara Arakkal (April 19 to May 3), was an array of water colour paintings with faces of various sorts that, one guesses, belong to the human characters populating around him. Some of such general portraits of expressions and moods are almost realistic, some design-like and some shown in a strange hybrid condition with other heads, objects or plants. The whole strikes as mannered and stylised, since the painter over-stresses the play interaction of the fairly decorative, linear contours and heavily textured areas that resemble patterns.