Review
During the 1960s, American artists realized the tremendous possibilities of their everyday surroundings in the creation of new subject matter, and the result was generally a bolder and more aggressive art than that of their European counterparts, much of whose works are derived from American motion pictures, popular idols, comic strips, or signboards. And one of the most important figures in the establishment of that time's Pop's vocabulary, Robert Rauchenberg once said,'if I was going to survive, I had to appreciate the most common aspects of life.'
And today when all this has grounded into developmental process of art and art history, doing painting is perhaps finding new dimensions within the limits of two-dimensional surface. This limited character of painting tells us the story of its 'survival' which had much pointed out to 'the death of painting'. So, often it synthesizes an amalgam of influences from present culture as well from previous art movements. And to make paintings today is a bold and revolutionary act too; which snubs one's nose at the 'progressive' march of art history by taking the insidious computer and digital technologies also.
In this context the new paintings of a pair of brothers Manil Gupta and Rohit Gupta working collaboratively, exhibited under the title 'Eco-friendly Hornification' at Stainless Art Gallery, New Delhi, from December 1 to December 8, 2011 presented by Seven Art Limited in collaboration with Nature Morte was a sincere effort to relish the human predicament in a humorous way.
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| ManilRohit at Stainless Art Gallery |
Manil (born 1978)and Rohit (born 1985)Gupta were raised in Lucknow and moved to Delhi in 1998. Manil received a BFA degree in Applied Art from Delhi College of Art in 2003 and worked independently as an artist for a number of years, having two solo exhibitions of his work at the Palette Art Gallery in New Delhi. Rohit earned a BA in English from Delhi University in 2006 and is a self-taught artist and photographer. The brothers started their collaborative work in 2011.
As a collaborative effort of Manil & Rohit 'Eco-friendly Hornification' produced images which have derived from popular culture, popular media as graffiti, comics and animation and built their conceptual branches by attempting satire on it. So, Humor is seen as a fore-grounded dialogue where one can speculate of discovering the ring of sarcasm as well. As Manil once said about the inspiration behind his paintings,'Life is absurd, silly and funny. There is violence and tragedy too. All we can do is addition of some humor to it.'
While this attempt within the paintings of Manil & Rohit is aggressive and ribald, it has again brought the American Pop Vocabulary with its contemporary pop icons. The difference here is seen in their approach of taking these popular icons. While earlier they had taken to popularize the popular for making their art popular; here popular has been taken for commenting on the popular. Art historical references are prevalent in some other aspects also; as they successfully conquer the age-old battles between figure and ground, abstraction and figuration.
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| Ecofriendly Hornification Cells, Acrylic on canvas, 6 x 6 ft |
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| Still Life, Acrylic on canvas, 6 x 6 ft |
All these aspects could also be traced in the philosophy of Theodor Adorno. Adorno saw the cultural industry as an arena in which critical tendencies or potentialities were eliminated. For him popular culture was identified as a reason why people became passive; in fact it makes people passive because it supports the ongoing system and blocks the critical faculty against it. The easy pleasures available through consumption of popular culture made people docile and content, no matter how terrible their economic circumstances. The similar nature of pop icons can be traced over the imagery of Manil & Rohit, but contradictory stance here in the intention of artists becomes evident while putting pop imagery into works. They are mocking on the ongoing system and trying to make viewers aware of themselves by attempting to bring people and their cultural identity out of passiveness. Adorno's work focused on art, literature and music as key areas of sensual, indirect critique of the established culture and modes of thought, there was also a strand of distinctly political 'utopianism', which also has been a visited area of Manil & Rohit here.
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| Utopia (Dyptich), Acrylic on canvas, 72" x 72" (each) |
The iconography of images seems sourced from children's comic illustrations and there is use of vibrant and bright yet soft hues of colors generally used for children's stuff keeping their liking and comfort in mind to attract them. Perhaps the artists wanted to create a fantastic imaginative land by the use of fluorescents mingled with metallics, where the viewers would enter with their childlike innocence and who knows later will delve into the inherent serious satire of it. The images giving the stance of caricature kind of figures, introduces texts into their bodies by using thought bubbles and speech blurbs. Text also has been taken from popular attractive culture; for instance use of 'what's on your mind' indicates to facebook status updates & relates to inherent political ambiguity as well, which again talks of Popular & Political (humorous satire).
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| Where Are You, Acrylic on canvas, 6 x 6 ft |
The painterly endeavors are skillful and enough to be expressive to convey and communicate with viewer as they employ to make line, form and shape with highly charged fields of energy and each image seems echoing the adolescent narcissism in collaboration with one another which lies at the heart of culture. In few of canvases the soft-focus blur of aerosol paint in the background is juxtaposed with an impasto treatment in foreground images. Each canvas is full of images, icons and signs to create an overwhelming impact and thus providing an opportunity to enter into a specific crowded situation where one would lost himself/herself for a while until he/she comes back to enter into another created scenario.
As to say in totality the entire display of works has provided the vigilant study of the whole human situation. The protagonist is perhaps mostly a reflection of artists themselves, but it also tried to make a generalized observation and statement. The issues of the works are based on that of the distancing of human emotions, 'corporatization' of the society leading to an overall sense of increasing human insensitivity. It's about today's consumer-driven society in a mad rush for (short-term) material gains. Both artists have provided to see capitalist effects of our filthy desires for luxury/extravagance and so they came up to make noise by pulling the 'Horns' of its contradictory harsh reality of unequal distribution of resources, which seems enough justification of the title 'Eco-friendly Hornification'.
Image Courtesy: Gallery Seven Art Limited & Artists.
Originally published in Art&Deal Magazine, Issue 45/Vol.8 No.15/Jan-Feb,2012
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