Don't cry for me yet

fighting with the army
false chirstmas presents
unanswered letters
promises forgotten
living with no strength
betrayed at the weakest moments
Jinni and all such memories
drunk dialing made me fall sick
disappeared..but still have left a trace
don't cry for me yet

Return of Chittaprosad and printmaking in Contemporary Indian Art

.

..Chittaprosad I Kayyur Martyrs I Subbarayan, a police constable, who participated in police beating at Kayyur fell into the hands of protesters on the very next day. People were enthusiastic to handle him. But leaders discouraged them. The police man was asked to lead the protest march holding the flag. He did it since there was no other go, when he got a chance he jumped into the river and tried to escape. But he got drowned in the river. Then peasant movement and Congress were strong in Kayyur and suburbs. Police and vested interests took Kayyur incident as an opportunity to suppress revolutionary movement. They charged a case against 61 people in Kayyur and around. Of them the court decided five to be hanged into death

40th issue editorial for Art&Deal Magazine 

by Rahul Bhattacharya (Notes) on Monday, 8 August 2011 at 13:31

I don’t know what kind of a difference the Chittaprosad show will make to the art viewing public of Delhi. Of course everyone who has seen the show has fallen in love with it and the show has played a very important role in bringing back the memory of Chittaprosad and the political zeal of his practice. It is at this point of ‘politics’ that the mind wonders as to how does being an appreciator of Chittaprosad and being an industrialist causing famine in tribal areas go hand in hand? It is almost tempting to declare this as being scandalous… labeling it as some kind of dangerous schizophrenia. But when insanity rules it is the sane who become mad.

Strangely enough there could have been a different entry. A hardcore leftist activist was just one part of his personality that affected his aesthetics; Chittaprosad also loved beautiful flowers, folktales and many such mundanities. He had his own aesthetic tensions between Stalinist art, European modernism and Indian folk. Actually the greatness of Chittaprosad lies in precisely these multiple points of entries. Thus, it was quite amusing to watch the leftist politics of Chittaprosad being highlighted in a show organized and showcased for an audience who practice exactly opposite to what he preached.

    Before I move on I need to drop in and say that the five volume book edited by Sanjoy Malik if exemplary and for the first time provides us with a rare art historical insight on Chittaprosad, and bringing back a lot of faith in art historic scholarship.  

    As the mind further wo/andered as to why/were his political art was splashed in a gallery’s PR notes and press reviews and not his sublime water color, still life, flowers or the Ramayana series! Maybe this is a betrayal of the continuing inability of art history writing to engage with aesthetics and be more comfortable talking about the content value of an art work. The value of art is but a coming together of object/lessness and how that is represented. There is a growing negligence in talking about modes of representation (simply putting a flower can be depicted in hundreds of different ways).

    This started when art history revolted against the over bearing rule of stylistic analysis. It’s slowly dawning to some of us that maybe the baby has been thrown out with bath water. In this period developments in the world of Theory also ensure that the very terms like ‘artist’, ‘style’, ‘mark making’ had all become almost too layered to be able to negotiated through but the factor which contributed the most was (possibly) the exponential investors boom in contemporary art and how in our hurry to seduce this market, we (art writers, gallerist, curators, artists) reduced art only to the level of the surface neglecting the complicated questions of artistic process.

    Parallel to the Chittaprosad show, in the warehouse of the 3rd Pasta lane in the Abhay Maskara gallery, a six week open door printmaking residency of T Venkanna began. This residency has recent parallels in the Religare Art residency and the long running practices of KHOJ. What makes the T N Venkanna residency at 3rd Pasta lane special is its focus on printmaking in a gallery space which is acknowledged to be ‘cutting-edge and experimental’. Traditional graphic art (the kind that Chittaprosad used) has been dismissed as obsolete and redundant. Again the great period of investors’ boom and its fixation on canvasses combined with its inability to understand the concept of editions spelt the doom. Also clearly there was less money to be made by selling prints then by selling canvasses. Maybe printmaking is the only medium that was first declared dead by the galleries and the latent interest got snuffed out over a period of time.

    A five volume book will never be published about it, but the real journey of contemporary print making in the years of 2000- 2010 has been that of extremely talented print makers converting to be extremely mediocre painters, and the system actually encouraging it.

Ina Kaur I Reclaiming Identities I Etching

 Thankfully there seems to be a turn around. In the last couple of years artists like Chandramohan, T N Venkanna, Preeti Sood, Ina Kaur have successfully managed to present print making as a vibrant contemporary art form and one day we will be very thankful to studios like Chap in Baroda, Garhi in Delhi and of course the Bharat Kala Bhavan in Bhopal to keeping the practice alive in a hard unforgiving decade.  

    How we have faith in art as a practice, and how that reflects on our engagements with art as a product will have a deep impact on how art develops. One important lesson to learn is that the market is but a part of the society.

untitled

kill me for a penny...kill me for a dime
am singing the redemption song out of tune
still yearning for the joy of being a fool

No place to die

hul Bhattacharya on Tuesday, 26 July 2011 at 17:07

Is it ok to be?
Even though its' only me
I am nothing but am
Doing only the things that i can
Just as i used to before
I don't know things at all
Thats why i fly when i fall
Could I do this to me
Now you can just let me be
No one said anything at all
It was raining and still it was dull
Maybe means nothing at all
I can now still be a child
Can fly no need to hide
But I am nothing but am
Doing only things that I can
May even fall when i fly
This is no place to die

is it hard to be a man?

by Rahul Bhattacharya on Wednesday, 29 December 2010 at 03:05

never went so far that i could not see
maybe stayed too close to let you be

does one ever know when the time does come
does the applause mean the the part is done?

'thud'..its that sound that's breaking my heart
in your pain in know i have my part

lips so warm and soft and the arms i call home
tiny hands for the junkies soul the gods had sent, or so i was told

the meaning of you and the meaning of me
did i stay close enough, or did i not let you be

the morning, the dawn and the dusk

by Rahul Bhattacharya on Monday, 21 June 2010 at 14:31

there is no morning without a morning
no dawn before dawn
there is no joy without living
and no tune without a song


sometimes it is yesterday
maybe even tomorrow
but when lips are smiling
they wash away all my sorrows


there is no morning without birdies
no dusk without sunshine going home
there is no joy without living
even if the sky is my huge blue dome

more than words can say?

by Rahul Bhattacharya on Saturday, 26 June 2010 at 06:26

udhti udhti ek paanchi aayi
choti si thi nanni si thi
sabh chodke..udti udti woh sirf mere ghar ko aayi

bohut khele bohut naache
phir meine toka..phir uusne toki
phir uusne toki..phir meine toka
usne toki mei ne toka
aur ek din naraz hoke woh chali gayi


mei akele khidki pe behetha
socha..aacha hua who chali gayi
ghar gaanda..haar kone pe daana
paayri thi..paar aacha hua woh chali gayi

saaf ghar aur dookh bhara dil
dheere dhrere mujhe khata gaya
khata gaya khata gaya..aur mere dil ko rulata gaya
dur kahi who paanchi dikha
jaane bina honto mei muskan aaya

udhti udhti ek paanchi aayi
choti si thi nanni si thi
udthi udthi udthi woh ghar ko aayi


botul khele bohut naache
khuub khaye khuub ghoome
london ja ke rani ko bhi dekhe
yea kare woh kare
uudh jayi phir waapas aayi

aandar se daari hui thi
phir tokunga
saapna todunga


haar ghaar pe paanchi nahi aati hai
har dil ko itna khushi nahi milta hai
nahi tokunga kaabhi uuse
choti si hai...nanni si hai
khuda ne mere paas bheja tha uuse
mere zindagi saajane ke liye
bus..itni si hi baat hai

5 hrs past midnight

by Rahul Bhattacharya on Thursday, 01 July 2010 at 04:58

dont want them to think any thing
this is jsut a hoax for them
when they see just this
they will have no idea of the theme

you always have known that i love to fuck you
want you to know that i love you more

you have always known that i love to eat you
want you to know that i love you more
you have always known that i love to be fed by you
want you to know that i love you more
you know that i love it when you like the worst of my poetry
want you to know i love you more
as you sleep tight..and as your love makes me happy and sleepy
i know that that i might love all your habits
but i will always love you more

boo rain

by Rahul Bhattacharya on Monday, 05 July 2010 at 23:21

rain
rain
rain
rain
rain
to my water nymph..fro the net somewhere
Stand in the rain
Whisper in the rain
Cry in the rain
Dance in the rain
Sing in the rain
Scream in the rain
Live in the rain

just another story

as we walk the sun begins to set
the allure of the night and its darkness rises
months spend on tearing the fabric
now trying to put together a beautiful patchwork piece
the little bird, the window and the tree
patterns that emerge as the patchwork jigsaw grows

form a girl to a woman
the story goes on and on

as we sleep the moon begins to set
the allure of the dawn and the dew laden buds of baby pink roses
months spend flying so far away
that there was no longer any wind beneath my wings
the little bird, the window and the tree
begin to emerge as i fly closer home.

form a girl to a woman
the story goes on and on

went for a walk but my knees were bent

by Rahul Bhattacharya on Monday, 12 July 2010 at 04:41

no trust
no shit
mindless indulgence
heartless dependence


no heart
no soul
a shadow of a soul mate
memories of a trust that would never forsake

we can run
we can hide
breathing in though a small pink skirt
always thought i could never get hurt

yes sir
no sir
the nursery rhyme went
went for a walk but my knees were bent

not worth fighting

by Rahul Bhattacharya on Thursday, 04 November 2010 at 14:34

a smile on a fragile face
moser
mornings
nights
the last rains of the monsoon
window sills
birthdays
tiny hands
coffee rent
the cramps in her stomach
the strength of magic
many many broken cups
a house by the lake

collateral damages of an army assault
in kashmir
in delhi
in kolkata
in nagaland

don't feel like fighting back
the army has no conscious
its not worth fighting against