Taste sellers
For mattersofart -artist of the month 2007 september.
R.B- In your works there seems to be a certain coming back to the idiom of the narrative. It is not like the 80’s narrative where the ‘meaning’ seeks to be located in the intentionality of the artist. This time, the artist seems to be stepping back and hinting at the narrative possibilities through a play with images. Giving a greater space for the audience to enter and interpret.
K.P.R- My challenge is there, painting has a history over thousand years old, and many artists have explored so many possibilities. Am trying to do something different there and find a space there…that is the challenge. One sees so many paintings, you have known the histories and yet you have to find something. At the end isms are a small matter, the process of painting will carry on, and it is through all this we will find our way. Consciously or unconsciously ones works will have a connection with ‘this or that’, but there are possibilities within ‘this or that’.
R.B- And you are constantly trying to achieve that.
K.P.R- Yes , and when you are in need you will get it, because you are trying for it. There is no doubt about it.
R.B- there is a refreshing simpleness about your works. It is not that the complexities are not there; it is about you digesting the complexities.
K.P.R- It is not about making it simple, it is about not making it complicated. You can enter it easily, that is the structure, and maybe it comes from the subjects I paint. The idea is not to make it complicated and yet keep the taste in it.
R.B- your works have a very specific cultural and local inspirations background, do you think their values are consumable to people who are not exposed to these cultural specificities?
K.P.R- I think the more local it is the more global it becomes. There are things we can share with anyone, otherwise I cant enjoy Iranian movies or I cant enjoy Tarkovsky, but you see one can enjoy expressions across cultures, I can enjoy anyone like say Chaplin. Even the kids…they will atleast be laughing seeing his movies.
R.B- For you it seems that a successful painting is that can touch human sensibilities across cultures.
K.P.R- Of course, it is in one sense, it is in all sense, and a painting is really enjoyable if it can touch a basic human cord. It is important to keep the core of your expression and remember that you cannot please everyone.
R.B- When you make a statement like touching a ‘human cord’, it would be nice if you can experiment with modes of showing your works, making them more accessible.
K.P.R- I would really like to show my works in more places and in different kinds of spaces, but my mode of working is very slow. I am always in doubt…whether certain elements or colours are really helping the painting or not, and then I will be keeping my works for a long time and I will be changing things all the time, until they seem appealing to me. There is no way to know between the four colour which particular one is disturbing…it is a long process. I keep seeing a lot of paintings, and they will sometimes inform me that certain colours are not working in my painting…and through all this basically I am not producing much work.
R.B- I am not talking about gallery shows here.
K.P.R- Any show, like this solo, I had a commitment for the last three years, finally I thought I should do it. Mainly I spend a lot of time filtering things out, that’s what I feel.
R.B- You have a ‘solo show’ coming after a long time, is there a certain concentration efforts towards it.
K.P.R- I don’t look at a ‘solo show’ as a project, which has to be executed, it is more like ten ideas, which are finalized and shown. And it is not that I think because it is a ‘solo show’, elements of each work have to mix, but also in the process of reading my works for this show, I am avoiding some works.
But then there are certain things, recently I was invited to a camp in Kerela, it was a nice opportunity to travel in that region and also to go home, but I had to say no, I have a ‘solo show’ and it is a commitment. I will not say I denied the invitation, instead I think I missed an opportunity. In my mode of working a ‘solo show’ is a big thing, it takes a lot of time…maybe I will be spending a lot of time sitting in front of a painting, at the end there is not much work I am producing.
just above
R.B- Do you have any regrets for that?
K.P.R- Yes there is a bit of regret, it means fewer people get to see my works…it is only in one or two galleries, and it all ends in a catalogue, they are not traveling much. And it is not only about me, some of the really good artists are often only exhibiting abroad and you get to see only the photographs in catalogues. Some Indian contemporary artists like Atul Dodiya you will really like to see original works. Galleries have to be a little more thoughtful about spreading works.
I want to show my works in Kerela, Baroda, and many places.
R.B. – Will you be doing a preview in Baroda.
K.P.R- As you can see my studio space is too less, so I tend to send my works across after they are finished. There are three works you can see, two I am still working on and the other I kept it just because you were coming down for the interview, and I thought atleast one finished work should be there.
Then now it is the rainy season, and I don’t want my works to catch fungus, these are artist’s problems you see. I would definitely like to show my works in Baroda before taking them to Bombay, but I cannot do it.
R.B- When one see your works over a period of time, say the last eight years or so, are you happy with the changes and continuity that mark the trajectory of your works?
K.P.R- Yes I am happy with the changes, and as for the continuity you said, when you see continuity and there is continuity, and if there is continuity, it will continue.
R.B- Do you ever feel the anxiety of stagnation?
K.P.R- No, I don’t think I will stagnate, as long as I have the process of finding new challenges and analyzing things and how they are happening.
Of course, sometimes when you are working there is a doubt about a particular painting, you will start with full hope and then you feel that this image is not working…and things like that…you stop there.
R.B- Are their any paintings of your that you don’t like?
K.P.R- It is not the paintings that I do not like, sometimes I am not happy with my painting if I had the capacity to paint it better…that kind of feelings I have sometimes.
Like the ‘Taste Seller’ and the ‘Merchant of Four Seasons’, now I am repeating them…‘Merchant of Four Seasons’ I thought was a good painting when I first did it, now I see it could have been much better, so I am doing it again
R.B- there is a certain kind of class representation one sees in your works, a lot of it is about the life and moments of the lower middle class, is there a ideological consciousness about this.
K.P.R-I have always painted people like this…right from my student days. Initially I was not conscious about it, but I heard it from many people. Then later I saw it and recognized it. I have always painted thing that are close to me and around me.
R.B- You mean thing that you can relate to…
K.P.R- No, it is not about relating to things, it is painting the things that you know and are sure about.
The salt seller that you see in that painting, the idea came when I was staying in Nizampura, one guy will come with the salt like this, the thing about him is that there is no money involved in the transaction. These people used to carry a weighing scale, and they will measure salt with the things the consumer is giving. If you want salt then you give him things like plastic bartans, he measures salt using the things you give as weight.
Then it struck me that that he is a taste seller…namak is taste, and then with that there is an entire history of salt and the barter system…especially in India. …and is through all this the painting came.
I don’t know how much of all this, the painting is communicating, but I am trying.
R.B- One final question, it has become a near mandatory final question to a painter featured in mattersofart as the ‘artist of the month’. Is mediatic realism dead?
K.P.R- It is not dead. No form of expression actually dies…if things happened like that painting itself would be dead centuries ago. It is more got to what you can do with it and how you can use a language to say new things. Many artists use mediatic realism to follow a trend or to hide their skills, but then someone like T.V Santosh uses the same language to make very powerful commentaries. One should really know what to do with an image.
