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| Diary |
Magazine | 09 Mar 2009 |
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| Madrid Diary by Bishwadeep Moitra |
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Q: What on earth is an Art Fair? Since this was an all-expenses paid junket, I didn’t bother to read the reams of printouts sent to me by the Spanish government’s tourism department. Reclining to a complete horizontal on an eight-hour-long Lufthansa business class flight, I had only one complaint to God—why didn’t He upgrade me before?
The Spanish government may have just slipped into a recession, but they couldn’t have been more generous in their hospitality—a fact the 40-member-strong team of journalists from four continents would endorse. All stops were pulled out to keep us happy. Transported on a luxury bus from our super-luxury designer five-star hotel, we drove through the beautiful city of Madrid. With the sun shining brightly in a crisp sky and a line of snow-capped peaks of the Pyrenees forming a natural wall on one side, we arrived at the fair site. An art fair is similar to any other trade fair, except that it is a fair in which art galleries participate. Arco Madrid 2009 had more than 250 galleries participating, from around the globe.
India this year was the guest country at Arco Madrid. And it was a disaster royale. I was embarrassed to see the insipid show our galleries had put together. The works of some 50 extremely talented Indian artists were on display, in a manner that was both unimaginative and tacky. Gallery Nature Morte and Jitish Kallat’s life-size installation of a skeleton structure of a potable water truck—put up by Gallery Haunch of Venison, UK—being the only saving grace. The other Indian galleries either lacked the experience or the creative finesse required to exhibit on a stage as big as Arco Madrid. Though the Spaniards tried everything they could to make India’s presence felt—all the 100-odd exhibition personnel sported India badges and the Indian tricolour was prominently displayed everywhere—it failed to create the buzz expected of a guest country. What a pity, for an opportunity as splendid as Arco Madrid could have put our artists on the international map.
Rants and Raves
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Photography and video projection have emerged as the two most favoured mediums for both contemporary artists and art collectors around the world in the past two decades. Photography, especially, for it no longer confines itself to chronicling and documenting news. In today’s contemporary art market, photographs are seen as valuable investments that appreciate very quickly. With the advent of the digital format, photography has managed to shed its rhetoric of technique and has become more about an artist’s self-expression. Madrid, like the other cities of the world known for their famous art museums, houses many galleries exclusively dedicated to photography.
The one name from India making waves in the western art-world is that of Dayanita Singh. Dayanita’s hyper-realistic expressionism has been acclaimed by major auctioneers, collectors and critics alike. In her pictures, she has made it possible to infuse life into the inanimate. Chairs lined up in an empty room, a dreary industrial skyline, or just a picture of a faucet—all still life objects, but through Dayanita’s prism they acquire a personality. Her innovatively presented new book, Sent A Letter, is on prominent display in big Madrid galleries like La Fabrica and Ivory Art.
Rants and Raves
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Madrid, like Paris and Rome, is a paradise for art and food lovers. There are close to 35 galleries of contemporary art, besides the grand El Prado and Reina Sofia museums. You hear legends about artists like Marina Abramovic who pushed self-expression to the borderline of insanity and death—she once stood naked on an ice block and nearly froze to death—or the Czech master Miroslav Tichy who polished plastic bottles to use them as his lens. You will be awestruck to see Indian-born master Anish Kapoor’s laser-cut art books. El Prado is currently holding an exhibition of British artist Francis Bacon whose work was marked by abstract expressionism. While in Madrid, do not miss Picasso’s Guernica at the marvellously restored Reina Sofia which till as recently as 1980 served as a public hospital.
The city is full of tapas bars and restaurants. Courtesy the Spanish tourist department, I had the luxury of eating in some of the best. A delicacy I will not forget in a long while was pounded meat from ox’s tail served inside a red bell pepper.
Rants and Raves
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A tourist orders the speciality of the day at a restaurant next to a bull-fighting arena. The sprightly waiter produces a big soup bowl with two large round meatballs. The tourist savours the dish, revisits the restaurant the following day and repeats his order. But this time the waiter serves the dish with meatballs quarter the size of those he served the previous day. The indignant tourist asks for an explanation, to which the waiter quips: "But sir, today it was the matador who lost the fight."
Rants and Raves
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More Diaries By Bishwadeep Moitra
• Goa
(28-Jul-2008)
• Tokyo
(09-Oct-2006)
• Singapore
(29-Aug-2005)
• Warsaw
(09-Sep-2002)
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