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Art Mumbai 2024: A walk amid sculptures to get viewers thinking
Summary
At the forthcoming edition of Art Mumbai, the city becomes the muse as artists create site-specific installations to be juxtaposed against the skyline
Sculptures are all set to become navigational tools—acting as companions and guides—at the forthcoming Art Mumbai to be held at Mahalaxmi Racecourse, from 14-17 November. The unique “Sculpture Walk" is a fresh addition to the second edition of the fair. Outdoor spaces turn into immersive dynamic areas with 20 works such as Wolf’s Sea of Poppies, Ravinder Reddy’s Devi, Monali Meher’s Unknown Landscapes and Parag Tandel’s Vitamin Sea and Coastal Road Project 3 interacting with the site itself. The walk, supported by the RMZ Foundation, looks at the expanded idea of sculptural practices, where the work does not hold just aesthetic value but also presents various intersections—of history, textiles, found objects, poetry and performance.
“The collection encompasses a diverse array of works, ranging from monumental installations to intimate, textile-inspired forms, enhancing the overall experience with both tactile and visual depth," says Dinesh Vazirani, who has co-founded Art Mumbai with his wife, Minal, and gallerists Conor Macklin and Nakul Dev Chawla. The Sculpture Walk has been put together by Veerangana Solanki, an independent curator and writer, who focuses on the convergence of interdisciplinary forms and practices.
“There is Monali Meher, who is based out of Ghent, Belgium, and is showing in Mumbai after a really long time. She is known for her performative interventions, but here she is doing a sculptural installation, which responds to the site itself," says Solanki. Meher, who grew up in Mumbai and studied at the Sir J.J. School of Art, has been responding to the idea of the ephemera and transience of life, across disciplines—be it paper, installation or performance. One can see Meher’s motifs and materials visible through her oeuvre, for instance, personal objects wrapped in thread, or the use of soil, sand and turmeric.
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She started working with glass after attending a residency in Ghent in 2019. “I recycled old beer glasses and wine bottles found in the basement of a cafe in Ghent by moulding them into sculptural forms. These deformed glass pieces were combined with organic and primal materials in Unknown Landscape (2019) a research driven installation " adds Meher. Over time, the uncertainties caused by climate change and current socio-political dynamics have impacted the way she envisages her installations. At Art Mumbai, she is creating Terra Incognita, presented by Vida Heydari Contemporary, to which she is adding layers of memories of growing up in Mumbai.
A part of the site is all set to resemble an excavated area, a sort of construction site with exposed bricks, metal rods, sand, water, oil, glass-ceramic assemblages, and pigments for an immersive experience. Terra Incognita weaves a tapestry of Mumbai’s cityscape, illuminating its diverse heritage and the enduring traces of civilisation shaped by the artist’s lived experiences.
There are many other ways in which artists can be seen responding to the city. Tandel’s Vitamin Sea looks at the relationship between the sea, the Koli community that he hails from and the urban landscape of Mumbai. He has used resin, construction rods and cement in this latest work, which is being presented at the fair by Tarq. You can see barnacles, crafted from concrete, emerging from the resin body, a symbol of the community’s dependence on the ocean. “For the rest of the city, the sea shore is a piece of land, for us, it is a farm that nature bestowed on us. As rampant development takes place, with coastal roads coming up, our fishing grounds are now lost to us. I didn’t want to depict the coastal road literally, so I used symbols," he says.
The very title alludes to the symbiotic relationship between the Kolis and the sea, with Vitamin Sea reflecting on the role of water as a nurturer and source of nutrition. The green hue in the sculpture represents plankton and marine organisms, considered food of the Koli god—the Bahiridev, or the whale shark. “When a whale shark comes, the plankton comes, and with that the fish come. However, now the marine ecosystems have become so fragile," adds Tandel.
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Wolf, a collective formed by Ritu and Surya Singh, reflects on the intertwined history of Mumbai and the poppy flower. Presented by Baro Art, Bombay Rising, featuring over 1,100 poppy flowers, looks at how 19th-century opium trade shaped the city’s skyline and development. “Links between the opium enterprise of western India and the creation of early Victorian Bombay point to opium as the crucial factor in the emergence of Bombay as a metropolis. Aided by a series of wars, the 19th century saw the opium trade transform from an illegal activity to a veritable gold rush," states the artists’ note. “Bombay merchants financed fleets of ships carrying fortunes worth of opium from India to China, fortunes that would help to build the city we now call Mumbai."
Wolf has made use of scrap material— bobbins from sewing machines, iron rods, wires, wooden crates, sacks of hessian cloth to create the installation. The poppies are made from scrap stainless steel from a metal mesh factory. Ritu Singh says the collective has been exploring the history of poppy for several years. At Art Mumbai, they wanted to create a fresh commentary around it, linking it to the changing face of Bombay. “From the very beginning, we have used scrap objects. Our journey started from family storerooms, and we felt good staying with that. Now when people see our work, they remember something that they had discarded, which could have been repurposed differently," she adds.
Found objects and urban detritus become an integral part of Niroj Satpathy’s Family of the Landfill, which is being showcased at the Sculpture Walk by Anant Art. By using materials from overflowing landfills, the artist looks at the loss of identity of both the objects and the people who work in them.
There is also a work in bronze by a master, The Ramp (Standing Musui) by K.S. Radhakrishnan, showcased by DAG. There is a sense of the familiar in this sculpture, with Musui, a Santhal boy that the artist met while studying at Santiniketan, being a recurring character in his work. “Musui takes on various roles, such as a writer, rickshaw puller, an imp or saint. In this sculpture, Musui leads a group in a ritual dance or spiritual ecstasy, with each figure’s individual movement contributing to a collective ephemeral experience, as described by the artist, essentially alluding to mankind’s eternal search for bliss," states the gallery note.
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For Solanki, the city becomes important in the way people interact with the sculptures. “The Mahalaxmi Racecourse is one of the few places, besides Marine Drive, where you can still see the Mumbai skyline. The sculptures—which are not static works—become even more energised when viewed against it. For instance, Alex Davis has created a 22ft-high sculpture of butterflies. When you look at it, you automatically think of towering structures. It offers a dual way of thinking of nature incorporating its way in a metropolis and how we navigate the urban space as people." The sculptures are not restricted to the gardens but have been spread out. You end up discovering both the fair and the outdoor works as you move through the spaces. “Sculptures have been placed in almost directional ways guiding you to the walkways at the back," says Solanki.
