Made in India

Source Le Monde Diplomatique by Philippe Pataud Célérier

New twists in old artistic styles

Source Hindustan Times by Damini Purkayastha
“These artists are quite talented, but they live on the edge of poverty. The problem is that we’ve dumbed down our folk art because we want quantity over quality. What we’re trying to do is get back to good work,” explains Majumdar. All the works in the exhibition have been done with detail, sticking to the age old technique. In true folk tradition, they also tell the story of their times. “The subject is the story of today, from the corruption during the Commonwealth Games, to the way women are treated. We are trying to break the notion that folk art is disconnected from contemporary life,” says Majumdar.
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Avec Chakra, Stan Lee offre un héros indien aux Indiens

Source ActuaLitté par Mario
Le co-fondateur et P.D.G. de Liquid Comics, Sharad Devarajan a affirmé : « Stan Lee est l'un des conteurs les plus prolifiques dans le monde, il a créé des personnages emblématiques qui ont généré des milliards de dollars au box-office et qui sont connus par presque tous les hommes, femmes et enfants sur Terre. L'opportunité d'apporter en Inde l'expérience inégalée de Stan dans le genre super héros et de lui permettre de collaborer avec des talents locaux pour créer un nouveau personnage indien est l'aboutissement du rêve de toute une vie ».
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Indias boom creates openings for untouchables

Source The New York Times by Lydia Polgreen
“This is a golden period for Dalits,” said Chandra Bhan Prasad, a Dalit activist and researcher who has championed capitalism among the untouchables. “Because of the new market economy, material markers are replacing social markers. Dalits can buy rank in the market economy. India is moving from a caste-based to a class-based society, where if you have all the goodies in life and your bank account is booming, you are acceptable.”
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New Visions: Contemporary Traditional Indian Folk and Tribal Art

Source Times City
Curated by Minhazz Majumdar, this show presents some of the stimulating new works by artist Pushpa Kumari and Pradyumna Kumar (Madhubani), Kalam Patua (Kalighat) Mantu and Jaba Chitrakar (patachitra) and Govind, Prakash, Sangita and Somi Jogi (Jogi visionary art). Their contemporary traditional Indian art is an emerging trend with a palpable energy and vitality.
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French’s toast

Source Times of India by Archana Khare
In 1996, when Herve Perdriolle sold off his house in Paris and shifted to India for three years with family, many might have labeled him crazy. That's because he was pursuing Indian tribal art. But what he has managed to achieve is not only extraordinary but also mocks the culture mandarins of this country who should have done that job instead. Perdriolle travelled the remote areas of India to meet artists and began collecting their works, which now make up his Galerie Herve Perdriolle in Paris. "I've always looked for challenge s and that is why I took up the challenge to put rural Indian art culture on the same pedestal as the urban. In late 1990s, almost no European art critic or curator was working in the Indian art field and that's when I decided to move base to India," says Perdriolle.
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Tribal Instincts

Source Times of India by Archana Khare
"I've always believed that when urban contemporary artists would have achieved a substantial price, then there would be space for rural contemporary artists, too. That's what is about to happen in India," says Herve Perdriolle, the French connoisseur who owns the eponymous Paris gallery. Perdriolle will showcase works by the late Chano Devi (Madhubani ), Jangarh and his son Mayank Shyam (Gond), and Pushpa Kumari (Mithila) at the India Art Fair. Neha Kirpal, founding director of the India Art Fair, says that tribal art should entice the young collectors as "the market for this genre of art market is still nascent and a lot of good quality work will be available at reasonable prices."
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We have a long way to go in art

Source India Today by Pavan K. Varma
I am afraid much of what passes off as contemporary art in India is a plain imitation of western trends. One development, especially that of installation art, frankly borders very often on gimmickry. In 2004, 500 renowned artists and historians in the West judged the French artist Marcel Duchamp's (1887-1968) installation of a common urinal, which he titled 'Fountain', as "the most influential art work in the 20th century". The elevation of common urinals may be comprehensible as part of a certain artistic evolution, but there is no need for Indians to be a part of it. Besides, installation art, embedded in our own cultural context, has a living tradition in the decorations for Indian festivals, marriages and a host of other celebrations in everyday life. My suspicion, though - and several leading artists I have spoken to seem to agree - is that most artists experimenting with installations are merely copying western idiom and themes, and are encouraged by western galleries and curators, and their hangers-on in India, to do just that. There is something terribly wrong in all of this. Too often, our threshold for self-congratulation is too low. Our civilisation was once the standard of excellence. We cannot be imitative or derivative and neglect what is our own in the blind pursuit of what is not.
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Tribal library a big boon for researchers

Source Daily Pionner
Researchers who wish to explore the information of Madhya Pradesh tribals would now get their desired information with ease, courtesy the tribal library developed by the Tribal Research and Development Institute (TRDI). The researchers need not to wander here and there for getting information on the State's tribals as all the requiredinformation has been made available under one roof at the TRDI. Usually researchers have to visit various places and different regions to collect information about the tribals, the TRDI has made this simple by bringing all the information needed under one roof. TRDI Assistant Research Officer Lakshminarayan Payodhi while talking to Viva City said, "The TRDI library would be the best place for researchers as they could get many references in it, as over 25,000 books on tribals are available in the library."
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Museum Links India's Past With Its Present

Source The New York Times by Gayatri Rangachari Shah
The Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Mumbai City Museum reopened to the public in January 2008 after a five-year restoration. Awarded the 2005 Unesco Asia-Pacific Award for Culture Heritage Conservation, the museum is an example of how a revitalized public institution can foster contemporary art appreciation across a wide audience. From well-known contemporary Indian artists like Sudarshan Shetty and Jitish Kallat to the lesser known Sheba Chhachhi and Nikhil Chopra, the museum has hosted art shows that explore issues of identity, historicity, mythology and urbanity. The museum has quickly become a valued cultural resource for this city of 20 million, bucking the trend of India’s other major national museums, which have low acquisition budgets and are seen in the local art world as lacking innovation.
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Occupying the Art World: Fred Forest Visits NYC

Source On-Verge by by Ruth Erickson
The project for the MoMA was the insurrectionary insertion of an invisible work, which would always remain beyond the grasp of institutional acquisition. Upon arriving with his group of volunteers at 4pm, Forest was greeted by three security agents who prohibited the work and threatened to call the New York City police if any performance took place. A twenty-minute conversation between Forest and the guards ensued about freedom of expression within the museum. The MoMA, Forest learned, only exhibits acquired or borrowed works, that is, works that have already participated in the art market. This is the very market being attacked sixty blocks further south by Occupy Wall Street and just a few block north by protestors at Sotheby’s. This is the market that Forest had made visible through the failure of his Oeuvre Invisible. After being trailed by security guards until leaving the building and area, Forest declared the creation of a new work, “The Conversation.”
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Masters and the economics of art

Source Times of India by Archana Khare Ghose
The Indian art market that has come under sharp focus ever since it started growing rapidly in the early years of the last decade is highly lopsided - the collector base is of just about 500, largely located in two cities. That's ridiculous if it wants to make a dent internationally like China has done. The Chinese art market is 40 times that of India's.
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They are like this Warli

Source DNA by Gangadharan Menon
It all started four decades ago, in the early 70s. Pupul Jayakar, the cultural activist who revived many traditional Indian arts, along with her assistant Bhaskar Kulkarni, was on a voyage of rediscovery. They rediscovered the rich and colourful Madhubani art in north India, and then the spartan Warli art that shuns the use of all colours except brown and white.
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Gritty Indian art-house film Gangor sweeps awards in America

Source Firstpost by Uttara Choudhury
The festival ran an attractive line-up of 38 South Asian films and was heavily represented by Indian films, as it has been since the event’s 2007 inception. Muzzafar Ali’s critically acclaimed “Anjuman” with Shabana Azmi singing her own songs, was the crowd-pleasing closing night film. All the movies were satisfying but Italian-Indian co-production “Gangor”, which had earlier got a thundering audience reaction in Rome, got tremendous festival play. It scooped the Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor and Best Actress awards at the New Jersey festival. The film made by the Italian director is multi-lingual with English, Bengali and smatterings of Santhali, a dialect spoken by the Santals who live in Jharkhand, Bengal, Orissa, Bihar and Assam.
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L'art contemporain indien

Source Art Market Insight
Il faut attendre 2010 et la reconnaissance de nouveaux artistes (Bharti KHER obtient une enchère record à plus d’un million de dollars, Jitish KALLAT dépasse pour la première fois les 300 000 $…) afin de relancer le marché de l’art contemporain Indien. Dopé par une croissance de 15% de son Produit Intérieur Brut en 2010, ainsi que par l’extraordinaire croissance de plus de 20% de son nombre de millionnaires (soit plus de 150 000 millionnaires en Inde en 2010), l’art Indien bénéficie enfin d’une demande locale important qui soutient ainsi la scène locale émergente. Le premier semestre 2011 signe le retour des records.
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Gloom in economy spurs boom in art market

Source Express Buzz
As art adviser Allan Schwartzman put it after Christie’s sale: “People want to take their money out of Wall Street and put it into hard assets such as art.” In fact, the boom in the collectibles market seems to represent one of the paradoxes of wealth recovery. While yachts, planes and mansions are stuck in a slump, collectibles are raging. Prices for the best-known fine art have all surged after taking a brief pause in 2008 and 2009 and these items have become a better and more secure investment than stocks or bonds.
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> site web Hervé Perdriolle Galerie en appartement Inde(s) Paris 5

Via India to Israel: The Migrations of the Bnei Menashe

Source ISN Insights by Shalva Weil
So far, 1,500 tribal people from north-east India have immigrated to Israel, with a further 7,200 due to join their brethren in the Jewish state. The decision (in principle) to bring the Bnei Menashe was taken four months ago by the Israeli Ministerial Committee on Immigration and Absorption, headed by Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. The Israeli government is expected to pronounce a final verdict on the subject in the near future.
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Indra’s Cloud

Source The Examiner
Here is an example: my recent sculpture, “Indra’s Cloud”, is made entirely out of plastic water bottles. These were readily available to me; I was staying at a guest house in Vrindavan, India that was also hosting a foreign yoga group. This group went through these bottles at a surprising rate. The bottles piled up in the hallways. It wasn’t difficult for me to collect enough to make this sculpture. The fact that it was necessary for this group to use such a vast quantity of mineral water is a direct result of the environmental devastation of the Yamuna River. Furthermore, the translucence of the bottles naturally lent them to represent a cloud. Finally, the narrative of this cloud floating on the Yamuna around the perimeter of the town recalls a local myth.
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L'art indien mis en lumière à la galerie du Jour

Source Hôtel Jeanne d'Arc
Grandement inspirée de l’exposition Magiciens de la Terre au Centre Pompidou en 1989, la rétrospective de la Galerie du Jour Agnès B. nous propose de porter un nouveau regard sur l’art de l’Inde contemporaine. Une exposition tout-à-fait singulière à découvrir d’urgence !
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"Une oeuvre est comme un chien, elle ne trahit pas"

Source Le Monde par Emmanuelle Lequeux
De nos jours, il y a tellement de choses que, à moins d'avoir trois avions et 50 rabatteurs, cela n'a aucun sens de collectionner. Beaucoup de mes confrères confondent art et marché. La collection ne répond pas pour moi à un besoin social, même si je comprends les gens qui achètent du Jeff Koons pour se donner une posture. Simplement, elle est mon seul terrain de liberté. Je sais que je passe à côté d'oeuvres qui resteront dans l'histoire de l'art, et je m'en fous. Pour moi, la seule décision possible est d'aller vers l'autoportrait, d'oublier l'Histoire et la réussite. De choisir des oeuvres car on se sent à l'intérieur d'elles, et qu'elles nous aident à ne pas devenir fou ou aigri. J'en ai assez de ces Foires catastrophiques où tout s'accélère : si l'art n'est pas capable de nous attendre, tant pis pour lui... Je n'ai aucune envie de me jeter sur le dernier artiste indien à la mode.
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Mumbai Journal: A City of Culture?

Source The Wall Street Journal by Nayantara Kilachand
Mumbai desperately needs a second major performing arts center or museum in the suburbs, and those who carp that space is a problem need only consider the proposal for the F1 track to realize that we do in fact have plenty to spare. How about a developer turns a defunct mill property into a performing arts hub instead of a mega-mall? Collectors hesitant to loan their works out frequently blame the museums for not doing better outreach, or for having poor handling procedures and infrastructure. What better way to circumvent this problem than build a museum to your own requirements? “People from Bombay have always been more open to contemporary art,” says one collector and art consultant who in the past has loaned works to the NGMA. “But where is our Devi Foundation?” Where, indeed.
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Nicolas Bourriaud nommé à la tête de l'Ecole des beaux-arts

Source Le Monde par Emmanuelle Lequeux
Nicolas Bourriaud a vécu un temps avec une princesse indienne, et travaillé comme conseiller artistique pour un milliardaire ukrainien ; il est incollable sur la musique, rock popu comme new wave pointue, et ne craint pas de raconter ses orgies hallucinatoires au cassoulet et autres vols de nains de jardin en compagnie du collectif Perpendiculaire, qu'il a fondé dès 1985 avec d'autres joyeux lurons du Maine-et-Loire. A 46 ans, il est le nouveau directeur de l'Ecole nationale supérieure des beaux-arts (Ensba) de Paris. Nommé lundi 31 octobre sur proposition du ministère de la culture, l'homme qui a créé à Paris le Palais de Tokyo avec Jérôme Sans, en 1999, relève aujourd'hui un nouveau défi. Et ce n'est pas que par la grâce du cassoulet.
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L'artiste indienne Gauri Gill remporte le prix The Grange

Source CNW
Au terme d'un vote public qui aura duré huit semaines, le Musée des beaux-arts de l'Ontario (AGO) et Aéroplan sont fiers d'annoncer que l'artiste Gauri Gill, de Delhi, est la lauréate du prix The Grange 2011. Ce prix, qui est le plus important du genre au Canada assorti d'une bourse de 50 000 $ et qui s'accompagne, pour chaque finaliste, d'une somme de 5 000 $ et d'un programme en résidence international, est la plus grande distinction artistique canadienne dont le gagnant est choisi par le public. Photographe indienne née en 1970 et installée à Delhi, en Inde, Gill a notamment étudié pendant une décennie les membres de communautés marginalisées au Rajasthan.
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Conservation hypocrisy: Again, they come for the forest

Source Firstpost India by Janaki Lenin
Centuries ago, humans and beasts lived in harmony. People harvested the fruits of the forest for their basic needs and were satisfied. They did not aspire to trade with other communities nor did they reap more than they needed. Other races invaded India, cleared the forest, established settlements, and agriculture. Then came European colonization and the amicable connection with nature was forcibly snapped. Large cats were hunted to extinction, and forests were cut down for timber. This is the widely held belief of our environmental history but it is no more than a romantic myth.
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Testing times

Source Business Standard by Kishore Singh
The market in its current state seems ripe for international sponsors, promoters and gallerists with their exposure and experience to start moving in and taking over the local markets to make up for their losses on their own home turf. If the disorganised Indian art market succumbs to an emerging East India Art Company Inc, it will have only itself to blame.
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Circle of life

Source Mydigitalfc by Jemima Raman
Tarshito, born Nicola Strippoli, is the kind of artist who thinks – in full circles and symbols – in order to let you think. His works per se, where he uses mixed media, symbolisms, and strips of gold, could at best be described as interesting. But his concepts, especially the ones that he had coordinated with artisans from India, are mind-blowing. In these works, the traditional Indian art such as warli and patta chitras go beyond their brief – and the occasional pallus. The end result, stretched into forms and symbols that Tarshito-the-thinker has outlined, proclaim the Indian tradition majestically. “Indian crafts have such depth and richness.
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Wonder of the Age Master Painters of India, 1100–1900

Source The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Indian paintings have traditionally been classified according to regional styles or dynastic periods, with an emphasis on subject matter and narrative content. Recent scholarship, however, has begun to securely link innovations in style with specific artists and their lineages. Together with a careful study of artist's inscriptions and scribal colophons, it is now possible to construct a more precise chronology of the development of Indian painting.
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Tibetan artists transports 20,000 kg of soil from Tibet to Dharamasal India for art installation

Source Art Daily
Through a long and arduous journey, the Tibetan contemporary artist Tenzing Rigdol has transported twenty thousand kilos (20,000kg) of soil from Tibet to India to build a site-specific installation at Dharamsala. Constructed as a raised platform, it allows people to stand and walk on Tibetan soil. A microphone erected on the platform invites the viewers to express their feelings. The design of the installation comes from the inspiration and interpretation of the Tibetan national flag and the history of Tibet.
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Sheba Chhachhi at Bhau Daji Lad Museum

Source Mumbai Boss
Following cohorts Sudarshan Shetty and Jitish Kallat, Sheba Chhachhi has taken over the Bhau Daji Lad museum for her new solo show, her second in the city after her exhibition at Volte earlier this year. The reclusive and highly underrated artist has brought together some of her best works: light boxes, installations and photographs, which all touch on the always-relevant topic of environmental degradation. Don’t miss “The Water Diviner”, located on the first floor in a room at the back—among the towering piles of books and newspapers are Chhachhi’s glowing book-shaped boxes, in which she niftily melds scenic, miniature tableaux of nature with photos of polluted rivers.

The Cutting Edge

Source Mumbai Boss by Deepanjana Pal
Something quite legendary happened last week. My Little Princess, directed by Eva Ionesco—no relation of the absurd theatre genius Eugene—won the Golden Gateway award at this year’s Mumbai Film Festival. There are two reasons why this is noteworthy. One is that My Little Princess belongs to that rare clutch of films that have won the highest prize in a festival despite being screened upside down, which is how it was shown at the Mumbai Film Festival. The other reason is that by awarding My Little Princess, the festival has made a statement: it’s no shrinking violet. Bring on the provocative content; we can not only watch it, but also give it $100,000 in prize money.
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See the 10 Best Booths at the FIAC

Source Art Info

> See the 10 Best Booths at FIAC

Art contemporain : comment se construisent les prix

Source Investir par Judith Benhamou-Huet
À chaque profil, sa stratégie 1 Pour les débutants dans l'art contemporain, il conviendrait dans un premier temps de s'intéresser aux relatives « valeurs sûres » de l'art actuel et de se faire une plus ample idée de leur création en visitant les expositions de musées. 2 Pour ceux qui chercheraient une aide ou des conseils, il convient aussi de choisir avec circonspection les intermédiaires et autres conseillers qui foisonnent désormais sur le marché. La grande majorité suit les vagues de la mode et des mondanités de l'art et n'est pas vraiment qualifiée. 3 Pour ceux animés par un esprit de découvreurs, l'une des stratégies possibles consiste à s'intéresser aux artistes originaires de régions du monde où le marché de l'art est en plein développement. Si les Russes achètent encore peu d'art russe contemporain, c'est en revanche le cas du Moyen-Orient, de la Chine -où il est aussi l'objet de spéculations -et de l'Inde, qui réservent des viviers d'art à explorer.
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FIAC 2011 Le marché de l'art retient son souffle

Source Le Point par Judith Benhamou-Huet
dans l'art contemporain aussi il est question de mondialisation. Pour Fabienne ­Leclerc, de la galerie ­parisienne In Situ, "les nouveaux "mastodontes" de l'art contemporain comme Gagosian, Hauser & Wirth ou White Cube, qui bénéficient de moyens financiers colossaux, pourraient conduire à une sorte de mondialisation du goût dans l'art contemporain". Celle qui défend depuis 2005 l'artiste indien starisé Subodh Gupta note que "ses pièces importantes se négociaient 30 000 euros lorsque nous avons commencé. Depuis qu'il est représenté par Hauser & Wirth, elles partent plus souvent à 200 000 euros." La directrice de la Fiac, Jennifer Flay, répond explicitement à cette inquiétude : "Je suis très attentive à ce que nous n'instaurions pas une standardisation du goût. Les petites galeries doivent être en mesure de naître et de prospérer."
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Warli goes global

Source The Pioneer
Men carrying firewood for food, women drawing water from the well, farmers watering crops, young boys playing with mud, cows grazing, birds flocking and the mighty sun shining bright. Those who know India are familiar with a busy morning in a quintessential Indian village. But in the expressions of Warli artists, the community has a homogeneity against the backdrop of the red earth. The villagers are all white, faceless and matchstick-thin, chasing lives made less ordinary by their stark originality of documentation and contemporaneity. Interestingly, today one of the country’s oldest art forms seems to be the most compelling way to tell the world the story of India and its roots. It has now been incorporated in cola commercials and the 2010 Commonwealth Games ceremonies.
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A la "Frieze Week", l'insolente prospérité des marchands d'art londoniens

Source Le Monde par harry Bellet
"Ce sont les particuliers aujourd'hui qui font les plus beaux lieux d'exposition, explique t-il. Regardez Pinault à Venise ou ce que prépare Bernard Arnault à Paris. Mais songez que le phénomène est mondial. Eli Broad à Los Angeles, Pinchuk à Kiev, Abramovich à Saint-Pétersbourg, Budi Tek à Shanghaï, tous créent leur musée, souvent dans des proportions inconnues jusqu'alors. Le phénomène touche aussi l'Europe de l'Est et j'ai vu des projets superbes tant à Budapest qu'à Sofia. Sans oublier les Indiens, ou les Turcs, qui sont actuellement parmi les plus actifs. Et quelle est la caractéristique commune de tous ces gens ? Ils ont pour la plupart une résidence à Londres. Et tous y ont des affaires."
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Couples Fuel India's Vibrant Art Scene

Source New York Times by Gayatri Rangachari Shah
A few months ago, Wallpaper magazine published a limited-edition cover of the powerhouse artists Subodh Gupta and Bharti Kher posing in traditional Indian wear. The photo was, in Ms. Kher’s words, “so clichéd, I titled it, ‘In another life.”’ The cover was true to form for the husband and wife, who both use traditional references expressly to create works of art that turn conventions upside down. This is where the similarities between the two artists end — the works themselves are wildly different. But they say the fact that they share the same profession fuels their creativity.
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In step with Indian ethos

Source The Hindu by Harish Bal
Mallika Sarabhai's production – ‘India-Then, Now, For Ever,' – which was presented at Thripunithura, was a documentation of aesthetics, about the evolution of Indian art in its multicultural and plural context. An amalgam of classical, folk, tribal, and contemporary dances, the show brought out the unique essence in each without diluting its flavour. The tribal dances, which existed even before Vedic times, were part of ancient rituals. The amazing drum beats coupled with tribal costumes and the energetic dancing made the opening quite breathtaking.
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Asia Triennial Manchester: introducing new eastern art to the west

Source The Guardian by Nosheen Iqbal
Can that be healthy? Cycles of boom and bust amid a critical vacuum can't promise a decent legacy for the artists coming up this way. Even now, it is difficult to attend a curatorial course specialising in a specific strand of Asian art; the knowledge isn't quite there, and even the Tate Modern admit that despite making great strides in acquisitions, their team of international art curators does not yet include an expert dedicated to the Asian market. For Mitha, this is where ATM can help the scene step up to the mark. "The dialogue starts between you, the viewer, and what you're seeing. You need to start at a place like ATM to get access to that work, to understand it in the first place."
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(M)other India at Agnès B. Galerie du Jour

Source The Block by Darcy Smith
It’s hard to imagine that a country with the highest concentration of world wonders could possibly have culture envy, but these days the French seem to have a serious hard-on for the southern hemisphere, namely India. The Pompidou’s current collection, dubbed Paris-Delhi-Bombay, offers a sociological look at Indian culture, while a few doors away at agnès b’s Galerie du Jour, both masters and contemporary fringe artists offer a more primal perspective. Agnès b has been dictating the quality of cool since her 60s hippie princess debut, and her Galerie du Jour habitually shows off the best in indie, avant-garde art. (M)other India is no exception, celebrating the paradoxically sublime yet visceral nature of the vast, diverse subcontinent, bringing the Indian “other,” so to speak, home to roost.
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Art for the sake of intellect

Source The Day by Kostiantyn Hryshyn
The first non-European Nobel Prize winner, author of Indian and Bangladeshi national anthems, talented poet, traveler, and humanist Rabindranath Tagore discovered the world of fine arts when he was almost 70. The next 12 years he devoted to painting and graphic art, creating about 2,000 works. “The dawn of my life was filled with songs, so let the sunset be filled with colors,” said Tagore once. It should be noted that Tagore never studied painting, he created his works as he thought he should, as his soul told him to. His contemporaries recollected that Tagore painted fast, confidently, with inspiration, and without editing finished paintings. “I don’t want to put walls around my house or blind my windows. I want the spirit of the culture of different countries to flow around as freely as possible, I just don’t want it to knock me off my feet,” said Tagore once.
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C'est à ce prix que nous mangeons du sucre

Source Art Info
William Kentridge, Pascale Marthine Tayou, Marzia Migliora, Michael Blum, Shilpa Gupta, Wael Shawky.
Evento 2011 — Par leurs propositions, qui comprennent des œuvres et installations spécialement créées pour cet événement, ils questionnent l'esclavage et les systèmes économiques et politiques qu'il génère dans nos sociétés. L'exposition s'inspire d'une citation de Voltaire tirée de Candide (1759), où le philosophe dénonce la cruauté quotidienne que subissent les esclaves dans les plantations. Une position critique exprimée par de nombreux représentants de l'Europe des Lumières et qui sera à la base des valeurs universelles sur lesquelles est fondée notre société.
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Paco Rabanne réinventé

Source Le Monde par Véronique Lorelle
En haut d'un escalator du centre Georges-Pompidou, elles sont apparues dans des tenues moulantes, cuirassées de métal, comme autant de Barbarella, l'héroïne du film de Roger Vadim (1968), incarnée par Jane Fonda et habillée par Paco Rabanne. Dix ans après avoir tiré sa révérence, le couturier espagnol Paco Rabanne (réfugié en Bretagne après ses prédictions sur la fin du monde) revient dans la mode avec un nouveau directeur artistique, l'Indien Manish Arora. Robe sculptée sur le corps, en pièces de python mordoré assemblées par des anneaux, ou tunique cotte de maille taillée dans du jersey métallique : nombre de tenues rappellent la robe portée en 1968 par Françoise Hardy, réalisée en plaques d'aluminium. Elle avait valu à Paco Rabanne le surnom de "métallurgiste de la mode", donné par Coco Chanel.
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Crafting traditions for posterity

Source The Hindu by Jaya Jaitly
Should India's traditional handcrafters occupy an elevated space in people's minds or should they remain on the pavements, bazaars, haats, and perhaps marginally in malls, to be looked at as poor street cousins of India's other cultural practitioners? Sixty years after three important Akademis were set up to promote cultural arts that come under the heading of dance, music, drama, literature and the fine arts, it may be time to take note of the huge reservoir of cultural heritage passing from generation to generation through the hands of craftspeople towards establishing a body that nurtures this heritage and builds respect beyond “marketing products” or subsidising “welfare”.
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Indian Highway à Rome

Source What to see in Rome
Le Musée MAXXI réalise la première exposition en Italie sur le panorama de l’art actuel de l’Inde, en comprenant qu’aujourd’hui c’est une zone qui vit d’importantes transformations économiques et sociales qui se reflètent dans la représentation esthétique. Le parcours de cette exposition établit une séquence intéressante qui nous mène aux polysémies culturelles entre les divers artistes choisis pour ce compte-rendu, où les significations et les allusions génèrent un espace de réflexion chez le spectateur.
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Ana Mendieta : Blood and Fire

Trop peu d'articles sur l'actuelle exposition de cette artiste née à Cuba et décédée à 37 ans en 1985 à New York. Son œuvre radicale n’a été exposée que de façon relativement confidentielle depuis 1976. C’est l’exposition du New Museum of Contemporany Art, en 1987 à New York, qui commence à mettre en lumière la force de ce travail. L'œuvre de Mendieta explore sans concession les relations du corps et de la nature, les légendes américaines ancestrales et les éléments (eau, air, terre, feu), croisant ce qu’on a pu appeler body-art et land-art.
Too few articles about the actual show of this artist born in Cuba and died in 1985 at age 37 in New York. His work has been exposed as radical in a relatively confidential since 1976. This is the exhibition of the New Museum of Art contemporany in 1987 in New York, which begins to highlight the strength of this work. Mendieta's work explores the relationship without compromising the body and nature, legends and traditional American elements (water, air, earth, fire), crossing what has been called body-art and land-art.
> Ana Mendieta : Blood and Fire Galerie Lelong Paris 8 septembre- 8 octobre 2011

Christie's Dominates New York's Fall Asia Week Sales, Bringing in $75.8 Million

Source ArtInfo
The mostly strong sales during September Asia Week showed that — no surprise — the thirst for Asian art continues to be powerful, and that, this year at least, Christie's leads the way as the top auctioneer for the market category. The Rockefeller Center-based house posted a strong sales in four of the five auctions it held to take home $75.8 Million, while its York Avenue competitor, Sotheby's, had only middling results after its three auctions, bringing in $31.5 million. Hugo Weihe, the head of the South Asian Modern and Contemporary Art department at Christie's, referred to Husain as "clearly one of the founding fathers of Indian modern art," and told ARTINFO that "after the sale, every collector in the field will need to have a work of Husain's." Weihe added that he has noticed a relatively new trend of Chinese collectors showing up in the salesrooms of Indian art auctions.
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Once upon a time, said my fictional grandmother...

Source The Pioneer
One of the last reports regarding the Hadron Collider experiment, mentioned the search for the God Particle was unsuccessful. And that scientists were planning to call the highly publicised event quits. The attempt hasn’t been shut down yet. However, it looks like theories of the birth of the universe will continue to be a topic for much endless speculation. Shampa Shah, who curated the event, mentioned that tribal myths generally tend to happen fall into three categories. Those of origin. Of sustenance. And destruction. This idea parallels the one about primordial Hindu Gods, Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva, representing creation, preservation and destruction. It is anyone’s guess which influenced which. What is also interesting, is in complete contrast to the Big Bang Theory, tribal myths throw the idea out, that at the start was zero, or nothingness.
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The great assembler

Source Livemint by Sanjukta Sharma
Dodiya was born in 1959 to a Kathiawadi family living in Ghatkopar. “In the early 1970s, through Doordarshan, I was educated in the cinema of Ray and Ritwik Ghatak, two big influences in my life, especially Ray. A few years later, I also saw films by Truffaut and other European masters. Bollywood was always there,” says Dodiya, adding that cinema is a big part of his life and a way to understanding deeply human concerns. Dodiya joined Mumbai’s Sir JJ School of Art in the mid-1980s. He met his wife-to-be Anju there and had his first solo show of oil paintings in 1989 at the Chemould gallery. Shireen Gandhy, for whom it was the first exhibition as a gallerist, says: “Atul has transformed from an artist to someone akin to a teacher since then. That was not a fertile time as far as art was concerned. There was no market as such for artists. But he made a mark.” Two years after his first solo, Dodiya received a French government fellowship to spend a year in Paris. It was a time of anxiety and questioning, says Anju. “We would visit the Picasso Museum often; it was just a street away from where we were staying. Atul thought it was already a dead end for him because whatever was left to be done in art has been done, what else could he do?
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M.F. Husain’s ‘Sprinkling Horses’ Sells for Over $1 Million

Source The Wall Street Journal by Margherita Stancati
Mr. Husain has long been in the “one million dollar club,” artists who sold a single piece for that sum or more. His “Empty Bowl at the Last Supper,” sold for $2 million in 2005 –at the time the highest sum ever paid for a work of modern Indian art. More recently, in 2008, his “Battle of Ganga and Jamuna: Mahabharata” a diptych inspired by the ancient Hindu epic, sold for $1.6 million. His record-breaking sales figures remain behind S.H. Raza’s and Tyeb Mehta’s. Mr. Raza’s “Saurashtra,” a geometrical painting rich in reds and greens, sold for $3.5 million in 2010. No other work of modern or contemporary Indian art has ever sold for that much. Works by Mr. Mehta – an artist of Mr. Husain’s generation but far less prolific – periodically break the one-million-dollar mark. His diptych “Bulls,” which sold for $2.8 million in March, was seen as a sign that the Indian art market was on the way to recovery from the economic downturn.
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Do We Need a Ministry of Culture?

Source Tehelka by Janani Ganesan
India doesn’t have a culture policy. This might be because the creation of a culture policy in a country as heterogeneous as ours is too dangerous a tinderbox for anyone to touch. But in the absence of a policy and any commitment to cultural activity, do we really need a Ministry of Culture? Could privatisation be the way forward? Unfortunately, no. Not even the most exasperated of our respondents wished the State to step out of the game altogether. Says Samson, “One person with a dream and a few good friends can make a huge difference to the arts. But private bodies serve small communities and are for the few, by a few.”
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Artistes Chinois à Paris : une rencontre entre Orient et Occident

Source Mairie de Paris
L’exposition « Artistes chinois à Paris », organisée en 2 parties, l’une au musée Cernuschi et l’autre en plein air, au parc Monceau, fait apparaître au grand jour l’influence qu’a eu la Ville Lumière, à partir des années 1920, sur toute une génération d’artistes chinois. A découvrir du 9 septembre au 31 décembre 2011.
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Commentaires : Belle initiative, on attend avec impatience d'autres expositions comme celle ci sur les artistes indiens ou encore brésiliens à Paris ! Il est temps de célébrer ces artistes qui ont eu et qui ont encore une passion pour la France. Il suffit de parler avec un jeune artiste indien, par exemple, pour comprendre. Il vous parlera de son pays où il y a si peu de musée et de galerie. Il vous dira son étonnement et son émerveillement devant tous ces musées parisiens où le public ne cesse de faire d'interminable queue comme si la culture était une denrée de première nécessité. La France a toujours ce pouvoir d'attraction et il n'y a que les français pour avoir un air contrit et mélancolique alimentant le fantasmagorique déclin culturel de notre hexagone.
Au delà de tous les efforts diplomatiques vers les pays émergents, il nous faut commencer par rendre hommage à ces artistes, devenus trésors vivants grâce à l'essor économique de leurs pays, et qui encore aujourd'hui ne cessent, à travers les nombreux interviews qu'ils accordent, d'être les plus efficaces ambassadeurs de la France à l'étranger. Pour que cela perdure, il nous faut rester une terre d'accueille et célébrer ceux qui nous aiment ! Beaucoup de générosité et un minimum de lobbying s'il vous plait…

Maqbool Fida Husain, victime des extrémistes même après sa mort

Source El Watan par Nacéra Benali
Même mort, le peintre indien le plus célèbre de l’ère contemporaine continue d’être la cible des extrémistes hindous. Poussé à l’exil en 2006, Maqbool Fida Husain dérange encore. Une exposition posthume de ses œuvres s’est finalement tenue dans la capitale indienne, après que plusieurs galeries aient refusé d’abriter l’évènement, invoquant «des menaces dissuasives».
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Leading contemporary artist Subodh Gupta to help state 'develop'

Source Times of India by Pranava Kumar Chaudhary
The Bihar government has decided to actively involve the country's leading contemporary artist, Subodh Gupta, in various development projects, including the upcoming international museum and the state's centenary celebrations. Gupta, who was in town on Monday on an invite from the government, met HRD principal secretary Anjani K Singh, who is also the nodal officer of these projects. The duo discussed the details of the projects. "I was born in Bihar and it's my pride and pleasure to assist the government As an artist, I will do whatever I can," the Khagaul-born celebrity said even as he expressed his "amazement and pleasure to see the changing profile of Bihar as a result of the untiring efforts of chief minister Nitish Kumar".
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National Museum Institute to organise Special Lecture Series on Indigenous Art of Canada

Source Northern Voices
Dr. Inglis is a Canadian anthropologist and art historian who specialises in the artistic traditions of the indigenous peoples of North America. He was for over 25 years a curator and Director-General of Research and Collections at the Canadian Museum of Civilisation, Canada’s national museum of history and ethnology. Dr Inglis is also a well-known specialist in the traditional arts of India. He holds a M.A. in Museology and Indian Art from Calcutta University in India, where he studied Indian art and architecture, folk arts and crafts, and ethnography of tribal societies.
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Are Chinese Auction Giants Guardian and Poly Making Moves Into the Western Art Market?

Source Art Info
Everybody knows that the giant Western auction houses Sotheby's and Christie's are looking East for growth. Now, it seems that China's two major auction houses, Poly International Auctions and China Guardian Auctions, are both looking to move into the Western auction market — or at least woo the west's moneyed collectors.
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Artist's idea of abode

Source The Asian Age by Hemant Abhishek
Home is truly where the art is. Home Spun, as the title suggests is an artist’s spin on the idea of home — as a place, as well as a state of mind. The exhibition encompasses sculpture, painting, photography, video and interactive installations that delve between the desire for sanctuary and the pain of exile while putting into form the tension between longing and belonging. On at Devi Art Foundation, till December 27.
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Rina Banerjee, du bazar indien aux petites histoires inquiétantes

Source Froggy's Delight
La plupart des oeuvres de Rina Banerjee sont inquiétantes non seulement par la récurrence d'éléments qui, en Occident, ont une connotation méphitique mais également par l'agressivité qui s'en dégage, qu'il s'agisse de monstres chimériques, d'hybridations métamorphiques et de figures féminines perturbées. Difficile de ne pas penser à Louise Bourgeois face à l'effrayante "Winter's flower" (ainsi explicité par l'artiste "Matières premières issues de la mer et d’immondices, voire de souris exotiques, dévorées par un monde affamé de commerce, qui en a fait des fleurs ; camouflé, à déguster accompagné d’un riz blanc") ou à Niki de Saint Phalle face à l'arbre aux têtes de poupées qui a envahi une volière.
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Traylor, Lowry, Mashe: The invisible connection

Source Debu Barve Art Blog
This is a story about three painters. Each of them belongs to a different timeline, nationality and social background. But despite their varied origins, these three artists share an astonishing connection through their styles of creative expressions. These three artists are American artist Bill Traylor (b.1854 – d. 1949), British artist L. S. Lowry (b. 1887 – d. 1976) and Jivya Soma Mashe (b. 1934), an artist from India. Of these three, two are officially recognized as ‘Outsiders’ (Traylor, Mashe) and one is not (Lowry), but his artistic philosophy is evidently aligned with outsider art rather than the mainstream.
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No need to look beyond Indian crafts, say designers Mona-Pali

Source Zeenews
It is time to promote local craft in the west, say designer sisters Mona Lamba and Pali Sachdev, who have helped revive dying techniques such as kantha and phulkari and are proud that the Indian fashion industry is already a global entity. "I am happy with the way the fashion world is moving, but we need to come back to our roots. It`s the east where we can sell western garments, but not to the west; it`s already there. Indian handicrafts have so much potential that you don`t need to look anywhere else," Pali told reporters.
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Venise 4/5 : le vertige de l'épure au pavillon indien

Source Telerama par Yasmine Youssi
Ils n'étaient encore jamais venus à Venise. Pire. En 2009, l'invitation envoyée aux Indiens par la Biennale était restée lettre morte. Rien de cela cette année. L'Inde a débarqué en force dans la Cité des Doges, offrant au public un pavillon d'autant plus inattendu que les œuvres qui y sont présentées n'ont rien à voir avec celles actuellement exposées au Centre Pompidou à Paris. Gigi Scaria, 38 ans, enfonce le clou avec son ascenseur dans lequel les visiteurs sont invités à grimper. A peine ont-ils appuyé sur le bouton de départ que des images d'intérieurs commencent à défiler sur les parois, donnant ainsi l'impression d'une ascension vers le cœur de la société indienne.
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A la Biennale de Venise, la lumière vient de l'Orient

Source Telerama apr Yasmine Youssi
Le meilleur de cette 54e édition de la Biennale de Venise se cache à l’Arsenale, où se poursuit l’exposition internationale avec des œuvres aussi exceptionnelles que les premières étaient affligeantes. A commencer par ce film vidéo de la franco-marocaine Yto Barrada, Hands-on. L'artiste y raconte les siens à travers une dizaine d’anecdotes transmises de génération en génération, chacune faisant l’objet d’un chapitre semblable à ceux des vieux livres scolaires. Tous sont illustrés par des films familiaux tournés au Maroc entre 1930 et 1970. Il y a aussi cette installation de James Turrell qui permet d’entrer dans la lumière et rend la couleur littéralement palpable, offrant ainsi aux visiteurs une expérience sensorielle et visuelle inédite. Sans oublier les photos en noir et blanc de l’indienne Dayanita Singh de salles d’archives où dossiers abandonnés sur des étagères ou dans des ballots attendent la fin des temps.
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The golden stroke

Source The Pioneer
Traditional painting techniques like miniature paintings done with the use of glass, paper, marble, silk and leather and thangka paintings, done on silk and cotton are an inspiration for some of the artists. “These paintings done in different styles and formats definitely motivate us,” says Kohli. “Folk art like Madhubani paintings of the Mithila region of Bihar, Warli paintings that bring out the customs, beliefs and life styles of the tribal people of Maharashtra using bright colours and Patachitra, are great inspiration for the modern day artists,” feels curator Ina Puri.
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The Straddling Art of the Indian Diaspora

Source The Wall Street Journal by Aarti Virani
“When we first had our exhibition, years ago, artists sent work thinking we wanted them to deliberately trace their roots. But now, increasingly, you see that people are people – especially since so many of us have spent years in our adopted lands. Their art may be something that harks from their heritage, but it may also be a part of their life today.”
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L'Inde chamboule Beaubourg

Source L'Express par Annick Colonna-Césari
Est-ce l'enchantement d'un Orient fantasmé ou la curiosité que suscite un pays propulsé en quelques années au rang de grande puissance mondiale? Depuis son inauguration, fin mai, l'exposition du Centre Pompidou ne désemplit pas. Elle enregistre même des records de fréquentation: 3 000 passages quotidiens. On la visite souvent entre copains ou en famille. Histoire d'échanger des idées. Et l'on se photographie devant les pièces les plus spectaculaires, qui ne manquent pas. /.../ "Quel décalage avec les oeuvres des artistes français!" lance Jean-Baptiste, professeur d'économie, en découvrant les chromos colorés de Pierre et Gilles, où se mêlent images de divinités et affiches de Bollywood, aussi clinquantes les unes que les autres. Contrairement aux Indiens, les Français semblent moins préoccupés des problèmes concrets du quotidien que d'enjeux formels.
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Subodh Gupta The Damien Hirst of Delhi

Source Livemint by Anindita Ghose
You probably think Subodh Gupta has been around for longer than he actually has. But it hasn’t been even 15 years since India’s most well-known contemporary artist had his first international solo exhibition. It was in 1997 in Bose Pacia in New York. He had arrived seven years before that, a penniless art school graduate from Patna, in New Delhi. /.../ The milestones of Gupta’s blazing success may lie in the new millennium, but the foundations were laid in the 1990s. The great irony is that while Gupta’s art comments on the country’s economic growth and its newfound materialism, he was a beneficiary of the boom himself. In its critical depiction of deficit and excess, his art tells his own story of a young boy who went from Khagaul to the globe.
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L'Inde face à la crise

Source Aujourd'hui l'Inde par Jeanne Leclercq
" A court terme les perspectives sont bonnes, puisqu’on peut s’attendre à une augmentation des investissements étrangers, ce qui amènera davantage de croissance, " reconnaît Jayati Gosh, professeur d’économie à l’université de JNU. " Mais à mon avis, à long terme ce n’est pas une bonne nouvelle ; la croissance que connaît l’Inde en ce moment n’est pas soutenable, c’est une bulle due à un afflux de capitaux, qui se traduit surtout par des investissements dans le bâtiment et l’immobilier, des placements qui ne font qu’augmenter les inégalités. Et comme toutes les bulles, elle est vouée à éclater un jour ou l’autre."
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Artist Chitra Ganesh at the Andy Warhol Museum

Source Pittsburgh Tribune by Kurt Shaw
The exhibit "The Word of God(ESS): Chitra Ganesh," on display at the Andy Warhol Museum, is a tour de force of color, symbolism and comic art mastery. The young Ganesh read everything from "Archie" to "X-Men," but what inspired her most during her youth, and especially later, was a series of comics called "Amar Chitra Kathas." Begun in the 1960s to teach Indian children about Hindu myths and the history of India, the series is still in production today with a print run of more than 90 million copies.
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Paris-Delhi-Bombay, quand l’art contemporain joue à l’ambassadeur

Source RFI par Siegfried Forster
Quelque 3 000 visiteurs affluent tous les jours dans la grande exposition sur l’art contemporain indien Paris-Delhi-Bombay… Le Centre Pompidou réunit jusqu'au 19 septembre les œuvres de 30 artistes indiens et de 17 artistes français dans le but de faire naître un dialogue. Deux tiers des sculptures, installations, peintures, photographies et vidéos ont été commandées spécifiquement pour cette exposition expérimentale. Cette initiative complètement inédite fait partie de la volonté de construire un musée global et de remettre Paris dans l’axe de la création internationale.
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Kolkata construit le plus grand musée d’art d’Asie

Source RFI par Siegfried Forster
Le 15 juillet 2011, a été posée la première pierre du futur Musée d’art moderne et contemporain de Kolkata, anciennement Calcutta, capitale de l’Etat du Bengale-Occidental. Le Kolkata Museum of Modern Arts (KMOMA) coûtera l’équivalent de 64 millions d’euros et sera terminé en 2015. Il ambitionne d'être le plus grand musée d'art de toute l’Asie. Ce sont les architectes de la Tate Modern à Londres, le cabinet d’architectes suisses Herzog & de Meuron, qui construiront le musée dans la nouvelle ville de Rajarhat, à l’est de Kolkata : 75 000 mètres carrés sur neuf étages et 44 galeries.
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Sotheby's Claims Record First Half, Citing Growth of the Asian Market

Source Art Info
On the call this afternoon to discuss second quarter and first half earnings, Sotheby's president and CEO Bill Ruprecht attributed the great results to tremendous growth in private sales, increased demand from the Chinese market, and exceptional tallies at their recent London auctions. The London contemporary evening sale on June 29 brought in over $174 million in one evening.
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« The Spectacular of Vernacular » au Contemporary Arts Museum of Houston

Source Art Media Agency
Les œuvres présentées étudieront les conceptions typiques, vernaculaires de l’art américain. Les artistes montreront comment des œuvres peuvent tomber dans le kitsch sans pour autant devenir de mauvais goût, juste en explorant l’iconographie de l’art contemporain. Ce sera l’occasion pour les artistes d’appréhender les lieux communs de l’art contemporain, « l’art de masse » comme le qualifierait Mike Kelley sur le site du musée.
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Folklores on canvas

Source The Pioneer
Alka Pande who curated the exhibition, says, “As an art historian and curator, I have been aware of Gond art for many years and been looking at what has been defined in the past by cultural theorists as folk and tribal art. I have included artists who belong to this genre of artistic expression in many of my projects in the past. This inclusion was done basically to show the plural culture and the cultural diversity of the land. It is a particular kind of contemporary art which portrays the living culture of our country.”
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Ethnic Gond art finds boutique on high street

Source Times of India
"The demand for Gond art in the international market is growing because of its affordable price range and vibrant compositions. It has a contemporary appeal and fits with any kind of furniture," Kedia said. Kedia, who owns more than 2,000 Gond art works, is collaborating with noted French collector of Indian tribal art, Herve Pedriolle, to host Jangarh's son Mayank Shyam, a promising artist, in Paris later this year.
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Folk art gaining in popularity

Source The Economic Times by Nalini Malaviya
Interestingly, folk and tribal art have also been going through a shift in content and execution over the years, and the effects of globalisation and elements from urbanisation are slowly becoming part of these traditional art forms. There is an increasing interest level in such artistic endeavours and some of the folk and tribal paintings are even being showcased in mainstream galleries. There are collectors who support and promote the vernacular arts in a big way, even organising major exhibitions representative of such art forms from across the country.
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A look at the (very private) world of the top art advisers

Source Financial Times
Another criticism levelled at advisers is that their growing influence has led to homogenisation, particularly in the private art museums that are proliferating today. In the past, collectors could be highly individualistic, with the Barnes in Pennsylvania or Sir John Soane’s museum in London, for instance, reflecting the quirky, but very personal, taste of their founders. Now, with advisers “ticking all the boxes” to ensure that all the major names are represented, their collections have lost that singularity.
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The Next Chandigarh ?

Source ArtInfo
Rakhi Sarkar described the museum project as "the grandest project in almost five decades, since the construction of the city of Chandigarh in the 1950s by French architect Le Corbusier." Herzog & de Meuron, who designed the Tate Modern, took their inspiration from temple architecture to create a design that synthesizes eastern and western influences, according to the Telegraph.
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Vingt ans après, les Indiens se rappellent la vie d'avant le boom économique

Source Aujourd'hui l'Inde/AFP par Ben ShepardAvant 1991, l'Inde vivait protégée des investissements étrangers par de solides barrières douanières, rendant extrêmement rares les marques internationales dans une volonté d'être autosuffisant, conformément aux idéaux socialistes et nationalistes du pays. Mais ce modèle a failli mener l'Inde à sa perte en raison d'une croissance stagnante, comprimée par une planification économique et un système d'autorisations administratives concernant la production des entreprises privées, baptisé le "Licence Raj". "Tous les biens et services étaient tellement limités", témoigne M. Bhasin. "Les gens suppliaient leurs proches se rendant à l'étranger de ramener des jean's Levis et des produits électroniques", détaille-t-il. Il se souvient aussi que les rares Indiens se rendant à l'étranger n'avaient le droit qu'à une somme restreinte de devises à dépenser quotidiennement et s'il leur en restait au retour, ils devaient retourner à la banque reconvertir les devises en roupies.
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Bientôt le KMoMA, un musée d’art moderne et contemporain à Calcutta

Source Artclair
Tout près de Calcutta, dans la nouvelle ville de Rajarhat, le projet du Kolkata Museum of Modern Art (KMoMA) vient d’être lancé. Sa construction a commencé le 15 juillet 2011. Ce musée, qui sera le premier de la ville à être consacré à l’art moderne et contemporain, devrait ouvrir en 2015. Selon The Telegraph, il s’agit de l’un des plus grands chantiers architecturaux qui aient été entrepris depuis les années 1950 et la construction de Chandigarh par Le Corbusier. C’est le cabinet suisse Herzog & De Meuron qui est en charge du projet. Inspirés par les temples indiens, ses architectes ont conçu le KMoMA comme une synthèse des influences orientales et occidentales.
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50 milliards de dollars

Source Le Monde.fr
C'est le montant des échanges commerciaux entre les Etats-Unis et l'Inde, qui ont bondi de 30 % en 2010, faisant des Etats-Unis le premier partenaire commercial de l'Inde. Hillary Clinton, la chef de la diplomatie américaine, a plaidé mardi à New Delhi pour le renforcement des liens Etats-Unis - Inde dans les domaines de la sécurité, du commerce et du nucléaire civil.
La coopération peut créer des millions d'emplois dans les deux pays, mais aussi aider à sécuriser toute la région, a-t-elle assuré au début d'une visite de trois jours à New Delhi et Chennai.

Centre Pompidou's Indian Excursus

Source ArtInfo par Emilia Terracciano
Attempting to capture the artistic fluidity of a massively complex culture is risky. "Paris-Bombay-Delhi..." succeeds in avoiding the pitfalls of many surveys, but it is hardly experimental. Perhaps the show could have shed light on the longstanding relationship between India's first modern artists and Bohemian Paris. In the 1920s, while Indian artists were nervously tiptoeing through the contemporary art scene in London, they were making their mark as moderns across the Channel. Amrita Sher-Gil, India's first modern female artist, plunged headlong into Paris as an "exotic Indian princess," and after independence, in 1947, members of the Bombay Progressive art group, including the painters S. H. Raza and F. N. Souza, chose the city as their second home. More recently, Paris has been much more receptive than London, which still shows little enthusiasm for showcasing the former colony's contemporary art. If Indian art has grown out of a host of Western reflections, the traffic has moved in the opposite direction, as well, making the all-encompassing category "Indian" problematic, perhaps obsolete. This may be why photographer Singh (photo : "House of Love" 2010 detail), who can afford to be more experimental, plays her Oriental card in this show with "House of Love" but still claims: "I don't know to which category I belong.... I am really happy to be unclassifiable."
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Rina Banerjee, 'Chimères de l'Inde et de l'Occident' au musée Guimet

Source Le Courrier de l'Architecte
Sculptures sensuelles mêlant coquillages, crânes d’animaux, plumes et étoffes indiennes, installations spectaculaires associant objets coloniaux et matériaux plastiques trouvés dans les rues de New York, dessins oniriques aux couleurs exotiques mettant en scène la transe des corps... Déployées dans l’espace-temps singulier du Musée, les oeuvres de Rina Banerjee y expriment - sans doute davantage que dans l’espace vierge de la galerie d’art - les ambiguïtés de sa double appartenance au monde occidental et oriental, les illusions héritées du passé et les 'chimères' des temps nouveaux, les contradictions du monde post-colonial et l’envers de la mondialisation.
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New perspectives

Source Deccan Herald by Giridhar Khasnis
Mohamedi never dated or titled her profoundly personal body of work. She chose to pursue the abstract and minimalist path, even when she belonged to an environment which was dominated by narrative and figurative art. Her work is often compared with that of American painter Agnes Martin (1912 – 2004), but Mohamedi was unaware of Martin’s work until late in her life.
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