Former Maharaja's Carpet Fetches $5.45 million

India has been in the news in the international art arena. One of the items that made a mark was a former Maharaja's pearl-and-diamond-studded carpet.

India is much in the news these days on the international art front. A month ago, auction of Mahatma Gandhi's personal belongings by New York auctioneer, Antiquorum created a buzz in certain circles. Few weeks ago, a former Maharaja's pearl-and-diamond-studded carpet was bought in Doha for a record US$5.45 million (19,873,662 QAR - Qatari riyals) at auctioneer, Sotheby's first-ever foray into the kingdom of Qatar. For reasons of privacy buyer's name is never released but bidding started at around US$5 million.

According to Sotheby's this masterpiece that measures 173 x 264cm. (5ft. 8in. x 8ft. 8in.) was once commissioned (1865 circa) by the former Maharaja of Baroda, Gaekwar Kande Rao. Imagine your normal knotted carpet at home from Kashmir or Jaipur or Persia. This regal one is perhaps of the same size as mentioned but with a silk and fine deer hide foundation that is densely embroidered in strings of natural 'Basra' pearls, measuring approximately 1-3mm, with coloured glass beads. For the curious: total estimated weight of the pearls is 30,000 carats and diamonds are estimated to be 350-400 carats in total - all set in silver topped gold or possibly blackened gold. Over 2.2 million pearls and beads have been used to decorate the small area. Sotheby estimates, the number of pearls employed in the design is perhaps 1.2-1.5 million.

From a provenance standpoint, this pricey rug descended to The Maharani of Baroda, Seethadevi Holding until 1988, and was displayed at Indian Art Exhibition, Delhi (1902-1903) and at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (1985-1986). Several writers and admirers have covered in detail the magnificence of this unique carpet. Embellished by seed pearls known as "Basra" pearls originally collected from the waters of the Persian Gulf, this symbol of hedonism defined wealth, sophistication, opulence and grandeur of the days of yore.

Susan P. Mattern in her book, Rome and the Enemy: Imperial Strategy in the Principate, says, "Besides being a magnificent manifestation of the taste and power of the maharajas, the Pearl Carpet of Baroda is also a reminder of the flourishing pearl-trade that existed between the Indian subcontinent and the Arabian Gulf."

Another scholar and collector, and Curator emeritus of Islamic and Indian art at the Harvard Art Museum, late Stuart Cary Welch said, "The Pearl Carpet of Baroda reflects the confluence of many Indian decorative traditions in addition to being one of the most luxuriant works of art ever created."

(A New York based independent trend writer, Raj S. Rangarajan reports on the art market, reviews books and films for media based in New York, Toronto, Canada, Seoul and India.)

RAJ S. RANGARAJAN

Asian Contemporary Art a Bright Spot at Subdued Hong Kong Sales

                    

      Vol. XXXIV, No. 17                                                                                                                       by Raj S. Rangarajan

Asian Contemporary Art a Bright Spot at Subdued Hong Kong Sales

NEW YORK—Sotheby’s spring sales of Asian paintings, held in Hong Kong April 5–6, were not as robust as those in recent seasons. This year’s sales totaled HK$317.33million ($40.6 million); the spring series a year ago took in HK$1.78billion ($227.5million) and in 2007, the total was HK$1.06 billion ($135.3million). However, some high prices, including several records, were posted for contemporary Chinese art, defying recent reports that this market has all but collapsed. The auctions also had solid sold-by-volume and sold-by-value rates that came as a surprise to some observers.

This year’s offerings included Chinese paintings, which took HK$129.77million ($16.6million);20th-century Chinese art, which realized HK$92.7million ($11.9million); contemporary Asian art, which totaled HK$66.4million ($8.5million); and modern and contemporary Southeast Asian paintings, which brought in HK$28.44million ($3.6million)

The auction of contemporary Asian art on April 6 was 74 percent sold by lot, 81.4 percent by value. A work by Chinese-born French conceptual artist Huang Yongping (b. 1954) scored a new auction record. Sixty-Year Cycle Chariot, 1999–2000, of copper, iron, wood and cloth, sold for HK$3.4million ($432,539), twice the HK$1.5million high estimate. A work by Chinese sculptor Sui Jianguo (b. 1956) also set a record: Legacy Mantle, 2005, a sculpture of a jacket cast in iron, sold for HK$3.14million ($401,826) on an estimate of HK$2.5million/3.5million.Yayoi Kusama’s painted ­fiber-reinforced-plastic Pumpkin, 2007, sold for HK$2.72million ($348,078), a record for a sculpture by the artist (estimate: HK$1.5million/2million).

The top lot was an untitled 2006 oil by Zhang Xiaogang, which sold for HK$4.8million ($616,815) against an estimate of HK$4million/5.5million). Yue Minjun’s oil Armed Forces,2005, was sold for HK$4.6million ($586,103), within the HK$3.5million/5.5million estimate.Evelyn Lin, Sotheby’s head of contemporary Asian art, said bidders came “from all over Asia as well as Europe and America.”

The auction of Chinese paintings on April 5 was 89.2 percent sold by lot, 96 percent by value. The top lot was Drunken Monk, 1943, a hanging scroll by Fu Baoshi (1904–65), which was sold to an Asian collector for HK$6.26million ($801,092), well above the high estimate of HK$5million.

The ink and pigment on paper Mount Jiuhua, 1979, by Li Keran (1907–89) was sold for HK$3.9million ($493,964), and Flowers and Insects by Qi Baishi (1864–1957) was bought for HK$3.62million ($463,251). C.K. Cheung, Sotheby’s head of Chinese paintings, called the results “an encouraging sign for the market that quality works are highly sought after.”

The auction of 20th-century Chinese art on April 6 was 80 percent sold by lot, 98 percent by value. Two artist records were set: the first for Lin Fengmian (1900–91), whose oil paintingFishing Harvest, circa late 1950s–early 1960s, sold for HK$16.34million ($2.1million) on an estimate of HK$3million/3.5million, and the second for Zhu Yuanzhi (Yun Gee, 1906–63), whose oil-on-silk mounted on board The Last Supper, circa early 1930s, was bought by an Asian dealer for HK$6.02million ($770,379), well above the estimate of HK$2.5million/3.5million. The latter was originally commissioned by St. Peter’s Lutheran Church in the Bronx, New York, and had been believed lost until it was rediscovered in a U.S. private collection.

Freshness to the market played a role in the strong prices. Lily Lee, Sotheby’s head of 20th-century Chinese Art, said eight of the top ten works had never appeared at auction before.

The auction of modern and contemporary Southeast Asian art on April 5 was 76.8 percent sold by lot, 86 percent by value. Indonesian painter I.Nyoman Masriadi (b. 1973) led the field withNegosiasi (Negotiation), 2008—an homage to director Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West, the artist’s favorite movie—selling for HK$1.7million ($217,950) against an estimate of HK$600,000/800,000. Another work by Masriadi, Ingin Menang Harus Curang (Want to Win, Must Cheat), 2001, an acrylic-on-canvas depicting an illegal tackle in a soccer game, sold for HK$1.6million ($202,564). Both works sold to private Asian buyers, according to Sotheby’s.

Oh Boy, 2009, an oil painting, by Filipino artist Ronald Ventura (b. 1973), sold for HK$836,000 ($107,179), four times the high estimate of HK$180,000. Mok Kim Chuan, Sotheby’s head of modern and contemporary Southeast Asian paintings, said that there were “exceptional prices achieved for top-quality paintings by masters,” adding that this market “remains vibrant” and ­noting interest from U.S. and European collectors.

Why A. R. Rahman is a Musical Genius?

www.tcln.blogspot.com

Raj S. Rangarajan

Allah Rakha Rahman (ARR) has finally reached. But does he think so?

With two Oscars in the same year – one for Best Original Music Score and another for Best Original Song, “AR” as he’s affectionately known in the industry, has put India on the Hollywood map for music. At 43, looks like he’s just getting started. Rahman said recently, “I have many more notes to compose and create.”

On the first day of this year, 2009, visually-impaired children appeared on a television station in Chennai and asked the music maestro some pertinent, inspiring questions. One of the first questions was, “since our world is basically ‘sound’ we feel we need to ask you what is your definition of sound.”

Known for his unassuming earthiness and willingness to work with anyone whether an accomplished artiste or a potential wiz kid, AR said, “it could be anything as long as you learn to dream.” Among the words he used to describe the experience were “ragam”, soul, language, spiritual, mind’s eye. “Music with its methodology or ‘isai’ (notes) is universal but is difficult to describe. Let me just say, music happens. It could be the pitter-patter of rain, birds in a forest, the strain of a tambura. It could be human connectivity between souls where one doesn’t need to see: all one needs is an open mind and a fertile imagination.”

At the 81st Annual Academy Awards last month ARR attributed his success to his mother’s blessings and his decision to always choose love over hate. Born a Hindu, A.S. Dileep Kumar converted to Islam at 23 and took over the name, Rahman. This keyboard artist, pianist, synthesizer, guitarist et al. was first recognized for his talent with a National Award when AR was merely 26. Around this time, based in Chennai he obtained a distance learning degree in western classical music from the Trinity College of Music, London. At a SAJA (South Asian Journalists Association) blog radio interview in December 2008, AR emphasized how music is often needed to express anger or perhaps change a tense situation with a sudden shocking sound. In passing, he clarified that his music degree was obtained in Chennai, not in London.

Ph.Ds Comment on Rahman

To obtain an intellectual dimension to Rahman’s wide range of talents this writer spoke with two doctorates – Dr. Natalie Sarrazin of College at Brockport (SUNY) in upstate New York, and Dr. Pavitra Sundar of Dartmouth College in New Hampshire – both of whom specialize in Rahman’s music and on Bollywood.

Sarrazin says, “AR’s light, jazz style borrows heavily from other styles and as a student of his music I am yet trying to figure out if he has a signature style, for he has this large repertoire (West African, South African, Japanese, wrap and hip hop). He happily borrows from folk music in a seamless Hindu/Muslim/western node in a post-modern identity. To a question if AR will continue to rule the waves, Sarrazin says, “only one (musical) giant at a time – remember – we had S.D. Burman then we had R.D. Burman.” Talking of giants, AR’s one ambition was to sing with Lata Mangeshkar which he fulfilled when he performed the duet with her in Rang De Basanti.

Dr. Sundar agrees that Rahman is a significant musical phenomenon. He has almost single-handedly changed the sound of Hindi film music (specially since he produces much of his music on a synthesizer). Hindi cinema had not heard such a distinct, catchy sound – and such a shift from the current style or sound of film music – since Bappi Lahiri and his disco beats of late ’70s.

Conceding his weakness for the keyboard, AR in fact told his young admirers in January how music has to be adapted to the period – whether it’s a movie on Subash Chandra Bose or Bhagat Singh or Shekhar Kapur’s Elizabeth, the Golden Age – just as costumes have to be adapted for differing periods. AR’s versatility and international flavor is evidenced with his score for Warriors of Heaven and Earth, a Chinese film as also his creation for Andrew Lloyd Webber’s stage presentation of ‘Bombay Dreams’ in New York few years back.

Sundar’s dissertation entitled, “Sounding the Nation: The Musical Imagination of Bollywood Cinema” examined how the music of Hindi cinema (i.e., not just the lyrics and visuals of film songs, but the instrumentation, arrangements, voices, etc.) draws on and expresses ideas about gender, sexual, racial, and national identity.

Sarrazin’s thesis was on Rajasthani folk music that spoke of trance music of one of the local ‘devatas’ with analysis and rituals. At his powwow with aspiring singers in January, AR elaborated, “just as music has no limits nor sound have any bounds, folk music or folk dance is universal. There is a certain magic when we think of folk music whether it is Tamil, Gujarati or Turkish or even Irish folk music.”

Jai Ho – Not AR’s Best

By many accounts in India and the West ‘Jai ho’ was not Rahman’s best musical effort – a sentiment echoed by both Sarrazin and Sundar in that Natalie feels AR had a better score in Lagaan (‘Mitwa’ was nominated in 2002 but didn’t win). Adds Pavitra, “it didn't work for me as a song. I thought ‘O Saya’ the other song that won him an Oscar nomination was great, though. It really captured the excitement and frenzy of the chase through the slums which the camera captured dynamically.”

Commenting on AR’s creativity, Natalie says, “what resonates in India is not necessarily resonating in the diaspora. Rahman was the first person to change the musical language of Bollywood and around the time when the Indian economy was turning around in the early ’90s, home video sales were also on the increase even in the U.K. and coincidentally, AR was a fresh sound on the airwaves.” He helped introduce Bollywood music to the rest of the world and what “I would call musical theater.” Sarrazin teaches musicology and the piano, has studied classical music theoretically and created courses for Bollywood. Her book, Indian Music in the Classroom, published in 2008, covers the gamut from Hindi-Pop to bhangra to the bhajan to the Urdu ghazal.

Rahman shows great respect for the director and the scriptwriter since “I have to base my music and nuances on what the movie aims to accomplish and more so since the sound track plays a vital part in many Indian movies.” To a question if Rahman’s success is a mere flash in the pan, Pavitra Sundar hails him as a leading composer in Hindi and Tamil cinema since the mid-1990s (Mani Ratnam’s Roja in Tamil was released in 1992, a film that made him a household name in urban India). He’s also good at “diversifying” – at finding new avenues for his work (e.g., his leap from advertising to cinema to Broadway) and forging new connections with prominent musical performers from Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan to Andrew Lloyd Weber to M.I.A., already popular in the West now.

But Rahman attributes his success to his basic multi-culturality. He says, life is about human redemption and the film Slumdog Millionaire brings hope and love and a certain positivity in today’s hard times. His mantlepiece is surely fighting for space with a legendary amount of awards from all over including Indian government’s civilian honor of the “Padmashree” in 2000. For India’s 50th year of independence AR created “Vande Mataram.” Also legendary are his hits in Tamil (Roja, Bombay, Alaipayuthey, Kandukondein Kandukondein) and in Hindi (Dil Se, Taal, Lagaan, Yuva) – to name a few.

According to Sundar, A. R. Rahman’s and Slumdog Millionaire’s Oscar awards signal the U.S. mainstream’s first real foray into popular Indian musical consciousness. Hindi cinema has been attempting to lure audiences in the West (mostly South Asians in the diaspora) for years. Films such as Monsoon Wedding, The Namesake, and Lagaan drew the attention of art house audiences in North America and “I should say that critics in the U.S. lauded the music of all of these films. The Kronos Quartet’s album with Asha Bhosle, ‘You’ve Stolen My Heart’ gave audiences a taste of R. D. Burman’s music, but none of these films or music albums, caught the imagination of mainstream U.S. media and the blog-world the way Slumdog did.” Significantly, Rahman’s recent win is not the first Indian attempt to capture the U.S. market – it’s actually the first time such an attempt has been granted recognition by a Western audience.

From Amjad Ali Khan to Gulzar to Grammy winner and soul singer, John Legend (who performed Peter Gabriel’s nominated song from the animation movie Wall-E in February) it has been all aces for AR. The stage adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings with music co-composed by Rahman was voted one of the 10 greatest musicals of the last 30 years in an online poll conducted by Dress Circle, a website that covers theater in the U.K.

Rahman has been involved with charitable causes as well. In 2004, he was appointed the global ambassador of the Stop TB Partnership, a project by the World Health Organization (WHO). As a producer on the single ‘We can make it Better’ by Don Asian alongside Mukhtar Sahota, he showed his soft side with all the proceeds going to tsunami victims, as did his 2004 tsunami relief concert in India. The A R Rahman Foundation, launched in 2001, aims at eradicating poverty and in this pursuit, his song, ‘Pray for me Brother’ is quite popular. Rahman has opened a western conservatory in Chennai where he trains about 100 students on the ABCs of music and music scores. His love for people and the underdog are constantly being demonstrated.

As AR reiterates, “Rhythm, melody and the resonance that a listener experiences is the best feedback a person needs. Whether the composition is spiritual or light, whether it’s a fusion of Carnatic music and western or a song by a fisherman about to launch his early catch, I have to think creatively.”

[Raj S. Rangarajan is a New York based freelance writer. He covers trend stories on art, reviews books and films for media based in New York, Toronto, Republic of Korea and India.]

Artistic Treat for All Senses, Art in ASIA, March-April 2009

Material for a film (performance), 2006, 1000 blank books shot by the artist with a .22 caliber gun (material from 2006 performance), shelving, and 67 photographs, Dimensions variable. Courtesy the artist and Alexander and Bonin, New York Installation view, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, 2009 Photo by David Heald

Material for a film (performance), 2005-06 (detail), Installation and performance, 1000 blank books shot by the artist with a 22 caliber gun, mixed media, and photographs, dimensions variable, Documentary photograph, Zones of Contact: 2006 Biennale of Sydney. Photo courtesy the artist and Alexander and Bonin, New York

Inbox, 2004?05 (detail), Oil on wood, 45 parts, 11 x 8 1/2 inches (28 x 21.5 cm) each, Installation view, Kunstmuseum St. Gallen, 2007. Photo courtesy the artist and Alexander and Bonin, New York

Artistic Treat for All Senses

Raj S. Rangarajan

From multi-media installations and painstaking presentations to colorful prints and video, artist Emily Jacir has done it all. Her redoubtable passion for her subject (Palestine poet Wael Zuaiter) which becomes an obsession in her two installations - Material for a film (performance) (2006) and In Material for a film (2004~) is the theme of a new exhibition at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum that opened on February 6 and runs through April 15, 2009 in New York. Emily Jacir, who lives and works in New York and Ramallah, Palestine was awarded on November 13, 2008 the seventh biennial Hugo Boss Prize. Established in 1996 by Hugo Boss and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation to recognize significant achievement in contemporary art, the prize carries an award of $100,000. At the 52nd Venice Biennale in 2007, Jacir received the Golden Lion Award for an artist under 40. As an archivist, Jacir creates arresting works of art that are at intensely personal and deeply political.

Born in Bethlehem, Palestine, 38-year-old Jacir’s work embraces closely the Palestinian situation while highlighting the mundane and the intellectual in that mid-eastern trouble spot. Jacir physically practised to shoot a .22 caliber pistol to personally feel the pain that Zuaiter felt when he was gunned down in 1972 in Rome by Israeli secret service agents. On display is a list of Mossad agents shown in works derived from a chapter by filmmakers-Elio Petri and Ugo Pirro - of the 1979 collection of essays, poems, and memoirs For a Palestinian: A Memory of Wael Zuaiter, edited by Janet Venn-Brown.
The creation also includes old telegrams (alas, we don’t see them any more in real life!), taped conversations by Italian police during October-December 1972, photos at a Rome bar, original manuscripts ? grayed but well-preserved - and even a unique coin in a white envelope - perhaps a lucky charm that Zuaiter constantly carried.

Two Memorable Creations

This exhibition brings together, for the first time, two installations that address the assassination of Wael Zuaiter by Israeli secret service agents following the kidnapping of the Israeli delegation of athletes and trainers to the 1972 Munich Summer Olympics by the Palestinian militant group Black September (to which Zuaiter was reportedly never conclusively linked). He was assassinated by Mossad agents on October 16, 1972, who shot him 12-18 times (accounts vary) in the lobby of his apartment building in Rome. The Israeli government, under Golda Meir, had issued his death warrant on the claim that he was involved in “PLO terrorism.”

Material for a film (performance) (2006) presents a memorial to one of Zuaiter’s thwarted aspirations: the translation of the centuries-old collection of Arabic stories One Thousand and One Nights into Italian. A bullet pierced a copy of volume two of the ancient classic that Zuaiter was carrying when he was gunned down. For this installation, first shown at the 2006 Biennale of Sydney, Jacir photographed each page that showed vestiges of the bullet from a .22 caliber pistol ? the same model used in the murder ? and fired bullets into 1000 blank books, creating a haunting mausoleum in graphic detail that, in the artist’s words, “is a memorial to untold stories. To that which has not been translated. To stories that will never be written.”

In Material for a film (2004~), which was first exhibited at the 2007 Venice Biennale, Jacir culled items from Zuaiter’s personal effects, including photographs, books, correspondence, and music, to create an intimate portrait. Jacir sought out his friends and family (documented in pictures), as well as the places Zuaiter lived and frequented, in order to present a chronicle of his life, work, and passions. As a child, Jacir has lived in Saudi Arabia and attended high school in Italy. After her undergraduate degree from the University of Dallas she did her MFA from Memphis College of Art in the U.S. She is currently a full-time instructor at the International Academy of Art in Ramallah and has been active in building Ramallah’s art scene since 1999 and has been involved in various organizations including the Qattan Foundation, al-Ma’mal Foundation and the Sakakini Cultural Center.

While the Hugo Boss Prize sets no restrictions in terms of age, gender, race, nationality or media, it is interesting that in the past 12 years, since its inception in 1996, it has been won by a different nationality every time: American artist Matthew Barney (1996), Scottish artist Douglas Gordon (1998), Slovenian artist Marjetica Potr? (2000), French artist Pierre Huyghe (2002), Argentina-born Thai artist Rirkrit Tiravanija (2004) and British artist Tacita Dean (2006). In 2008 it was the turn of Emily Jacir - an artist born in Bethlehem, Palestine.

Art market slow but should rebound

With a downturn in world economies this writer asked a Bangalore-based auctioneer, M. Maher Dadha, chairman and managing director of Bid & Hammer about prospects for the art industry.

Excerpts

RR: Following a slowing down of the economy do you also see a slowdown in the buying of contemporary art or higher-priced bronzes by collectors, dealers, galleries?

MMD: The slowdown in the economy is bound to affect the sale of high-priced art, but only if it does not intrinsically affect values. The rich or the super-rich who have not been personally affected by the downturn will continue to buy works of good quality.

RR: Over the past 5 to 6 years, creations by many Indian artists have sold exemplarily well -- some to the tune of US$ 1 million. Do you think soaring prices for contemporary Indian art will continue in spite of the depressed economic situation?

MMD: Prices of works by some contemporary Indian artists have been reaching astonishingly high levels and that too at a very quick pace which has been due to speculation fuelled by certain syndicated forces working in the market. Thus the ongoing correction is good for the market and in the short-to-medium term, the prices of works by some artists will go up but at realistic, sustainable levels. Indian artists are still under-valued, their potential is pretty high as they are increasingly being recognized on a global stage. Also, many Indians in India are buying expensive creations from artists such as Husain, Tyeb Mehta, Godbole and Subodh Gupta at auctions abroad in view of their universal appeal.

RR: Expensive bronzes seem to be bought more often by corporate outfits or galleries owned by non-Indian outfits. Your comments?

MMD: Corporate entities generally tend to buy bronzes or engage sculptors to thematically decorate their corporate offices, gardens, campuses, meeting rooms, etc. and because they have access to large funds it is easier for them to take a decision to buy a piece of bronze or sculpture. However, the domestic Indian market has also been picking up and in the next 2-3 years I foresee the buying of bronzes and sculptures increasing manifold.

(A New York-based trend writer, Raj Rangarajan reports on the art market and contributes to publications in the United States, Canada, Seoul and India.)

RAJ S RANGARAJAN
TALKTORETAILPLUS@YAHOO.COM

Mixed World Reviews for Slumdog Millionaire

By Raj S. Rangarajan

It all started in Toronto.

It was the first city to recognize the film – Slumdog Millionaire – with the People’s Choice Award way back in September 2008, and soon came recognition at Telluride Film Festival in Colorado. The film was released in November 2008 in a few theaters in North America rather quietly and not too much was expected of Slumdog.

Dev Patel and Freida Pinto

While the Academy Award event in Los Angeles on February 22 was the culmination of the effort preceded by Best Adapted Screenplay award from the Writers Guild of America and BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Awards) on February 8 in London, it was one meteoric rise for the directors, creative folk, crew and cast of the movie. December drew more awards starting with a nod by the Los Angeles Film Critics Association and another from the New York Film Critics' Circle, as well as six nominations for the Critics Choice Awards.

The International Press Academy awarded three Satellite Awards including Best Picture – Drama, Best Director and Best Score to the film. It also won four EDA (Excellent Dynamic Activism) Awards from the Alliance of Women Film Journalists including for Best Film and Best Direction. The Screen Actors Guild chimed in with Dev Patel (Jamal) in a lead role and so did London Critics’ Circle with nods for six nominations. Detroit Film Critics Society and Florida Film Critics Circle recognized the movie and soon Chicago Film Critics Association did the same. The mantel shelf was getting crowded.

The buzz was now spreading in film circles. Producers Guild of America (PGA) had put the acclaimed film on track to be a major contender at the Oscars in California. The 14th Annual Critics’ Choice Awards conferred five top prizes and soon followed the Los Angeles Broadcast Film Critics Association that represents 200 of the top film critics across the United States. Soon came the Golden Globes on January 8 and The Directors Guild of America awarded its highest honor, the DGA Award for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Feature Film, to Danny Boyle for Slumdog Millionaire on January 31. This movie was Boyle’s eighth feature film, and he was visibly thrilled.

Exploiting the Underprivileged

It’s amazing how the entire film world in the United States, Canada and in Europe went gaga over a movie that is India-based, but in India where the film was made, reviews have been mixed. Part of the reaction seems to stem from a seeming exploitation of poverty in India and a candid portrayal of a love story that touches on the winning of huge rupee amounts. Speculation is also rife that because director, Danny Boyle is British just as Richard Attenborough is of British origin, the movie attempted to make fun of the underdog.

Simon Beaufoy, the British screen writer who won was excited to adapt Indian diplomat-cum-writer Vikas Swarup’s novel “Q&A” since he said, he had the flexibility of changing the narrative to emphasize love instead of money. Two brothers – Jamal and Salim – are poles apart in personalities but their binding love in spite of setbacks comes through in the writer’s creation.

As Anil Kapoor (Prem Kumar, the question-master in the film) says, after the first rave reviews, everything was a surprise, and it was difficult for everything to sink in. He adds: “The past two-three years have been phenomenal for me, and from a fulfillment standpoint I am happy with whatever I have done – both as actor and producer.”

Doors have opened already for the Slumdog lead – Freida Pinto who has been signed up by film maker Woody Allen with Spanish actor Antonio Banderas, stars Naomi Watts, Josh Brolin and Anthony Hopkins in a film to be made in London. Well-known director of supernatural films, Night T. Shyamalan (of Indian origin) has picked Dev Patel for his next movie, a martial-arts movie, titled The Last Airbender. Dev would perhaps fit in seamlessly in the film since he has a black belt in Tae Kwando and dreams of making a martial arts movie like Britain's Bruce Lee. Slumdog’s success has spun off favorable impacts for many individuals starting with the young children who will obtain a decent education to A.R. Rahman’s singers who will go on to higher octaves.

Dev Patel (Jamal) grew up in Harrow in North West London, U.K. and played Anwar Kharral in the hit British teen show, Skins. Dev says, he grew up with Bollywood films at home, and “being a London kid, a British Asian, I was happy to get in touch with my Indian roots, and I found another piece of myself when I was in Mumbai. I really wanted to have a chance to play a scene when I was actually in the depths in the slums, immersed in that environment.” In a dramatic cameo a younger, excited Jamal, about to meet actor Amitabh Bachchan (played by Feroze Khan) actually falls into a trough of night soil (actually, peanut butter, clarifies Dev, helpfully).

Also acclaiming the movie was Vancouver Film Critics Circle, Phoenix Film Credits Society, Oklahoma Critics Circle, Writers Guild of America for best Adapted Screenplay for screenwriter Simon Beaufoy and Anthony Dod Mantle earned a Best Cinematography nomination from the American Society of Cinematographers. The NAACP Image Awards (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) said, yes. There seemed to be no letting up and by mid-February, the India-made movie seemed a shoo-in.

While everyone was preoccupied with the success of Slumdog, another director, Megan Mylan quietly celebrated her Oscar win with her 39-minute documentary – Smile Pinki – produced in Hindi with English subtitles that relates to a 6-year-old village girl, Pinki from Mirzapur district, who is surgically treated for a cleft palate.

Ian Tapp, Richard Pryke and Resul Pookutty celebrated their victory in the sound mixing category. Resul dedicated his award to India while ‘Jai Ho’ A.R. Rahman thanked his mother and declared in his mother tongue, Tamil: Ella pughalum iraivanuke (“all glory to God”). The film also received honors for its score, cinematography, sound editing and film editing. (See separate box for Winner categories)

Not a Success in India

It is interesting that the movie is more popular in North America than in India even today.

As of week 16 (Feb 27 to March1) the movie has grossed $115,024,121 in 2,943 theaters, the second highest grossing film in distributor, Fox Searchlight’s history.

Following controversies stirred up by vested interests in India, the film is not doing too well at the box office perhaps because poverty has been portrayed blatantly. Admittedly, many filmgoers, find it difficult to accept negative images of India specially since over the past few years, she has been riding the crest of a success wave. There is also chatter on blogs that A.R. Raman did not give sufficient credit to his singers and musicians.

Finally, lets remember, it is just a movie – it is fictional – for crying out loud. Why should every movie have a message or an agenda?

[Raj S. Rangarajan is a New York based freelance writer. He covers trend stories on art, travel and lifestyles and reviews books, films and plays for media based in New York, California, Toronto, South Korea, India and Australia.]

Oscar Score To Date
1983: Oscar for Best Picture – Gandhi and for Best Costume Designer, Bhanu Athaiya
1992: Satyajit Ray won an Honorary Academy prize for contribution to world cinema.
2009: Among the Oscar statuettes handed out at the 81st annual Academy Awards at the Kodak theatre in Los Angeles on Sunday, February 22, 2009, eight were for Slumdog Millionaire and the ninth one was Best Documentary Smile Pinki about a poor Indian village girl:
Film producer: Christian Colson
Best song: Jai Ho, by A.R. Rahman and Gulzar
Best film editing: Chris Dickens
Best cinematography: Anthony Dod Mantle
Best director: Danny Boyle
Best original score: A.R. Rahman
Best sound mixing: Ian Tapp, Richard Pryke and Resul Pookutty
Best adapted screenplay: Simon Beaufoy
Documentary film about an Indian girl that won an Oscar was:
Best documentary short: Megan Mylan for Smile Pinki

For Art's Sake

http://www.india-today.com/itoday/20011224/na-arts.shtml -- Dec. 24, 2001
India Today column:

CURRENT ISSUE DEC 24, 2001

NORTH AMERICA SPECIAL: THE ARTS


The $30m project to revamp the Asian Society has resulted in 4,000 sq ft more for new exhibitions

By Raj S. Rangarajan

After over a year of renovation, the Asia Society in Manhattan has reopened its doors to the arts again much to the delight of New York's arty crowd. Local architect Bartholomew Voorsanger helped add 4,000 sq ft of interactive dimension and open space to the museum and society-a 45-year-old nonprofit institution dedicated to fostering understanding and promotion of Asia and Asian art.

Vishakha N. Desai, senior president and director of the society, is enthusiastic about the result. "This $30 million project has completely revamped the area and doubled the gallery space. We are now wired electronically with high-tech customized browsers so that patrons can learn about Asia and we have devised new methods to manipulate images in a fun-filled setting."

CASE FOR SPACE: Views of the revamped Asian Society; An 8th century Ganesha

The place is now more attractive to the younger generation with three digital mouse like objects (read stones) leading viewers to visual information projected from an overhead device-an experience that is original and interesting.

Coinciding with the reopening of the society, three new exhibitions have been organized. These are Conversations with Traditions: Shahzia Sikander and Nilima Sheikh; Monks and Merchants: Silk Road Treasures from Northwest China, 4th to 7th Century; and The Creative Eye: New Perspectives on Asia Society's Rockefeller Collection.

"Conversations with Traditions" curated and conceptualized by Desai, who has strong art credentials herself, showcases collaborative original works from two women South Asian artists: 56-year-old Nilima Sheikh from Baroda and 31-year-old Pakistan-born Shahzia Sikander, now a resident of new York.

Sheikh and Sikander have each created 50 works included in a 38' x 5' long scrolls. The installation of ephemeral, translucent strips of paper covers the entire wall space from the lobby to the third floor forming a magnificent visage. The exhibition will be on till February 17 next year.

Also open till Spring is The Creative Eye-a permanent collection of Asian masterpieces that John D. Rockefeller and his wife had collected and which now belong to the Asia Society. Founded in 1956 by John D. Rockefeller the IIIrd, the Society has a worldwide reach with regional centers in three cities in America and in Melbourne, Australia, Hong Kong and representative offices in San Francisco, Manila and Shanghai.

An 8th century Ganesha

How the current exhibition was put together is interesting. Desai explains, "We invited 30 prominent artists-performers such as Chandralekha and Malavika Sarukkai and writers such as Pico Iyer and Gita Mehta, and other contemporary visual artists from the western world-to view the collection and requested them to choose their favorite objects and explain why."

The objective was to build a creator's archive. Normally a curator would write the small blurbs on various objects, "But this time, we asked creative folk to freely comment on whatever was meaningful to them," says Desai. The people chosen were those from Asia or those with a profound interest in Asia.

Among the pieces at The Creative Eye are an 8th century sandstone Ganesha from Uttar Pradesh which has drawn a lot of attention from westerners as well as Asians. Gita Mehta, author of Karma Cola and Snakes and Ladders, says of the Ganesha: "This is a suave, elegant dancer who throws out his left hip with sensual, I dare say sexy, finesse while observing us with aloof tiny eyes, as if to say, 'Jump into it! Let's see what you can do! I dare you!'."

SMALL IS EXPRESSIVE: A miniature (top) by Sheikh and Sikander; the artists
Thirty prominent artists chose their favorite objects to exhibit in The Creative Eye.

Mehta prefers the traditional description of the elephant-god in "endearingly sensual, even humorous dance postures, inviting devotees to approach him as the remover of obstacles. But one of Ganesha's tusks is always broken-here held aloft in a left hand, making the god particularly beloved to writers."

New Yorker Milton Glaser who designed the famous "I Love NY logo" (with a heart sign for love) says of Ganesha, "This playful depiction of Ganesha charms immediately. The sense of motion reminds one of a futuristic painting or a stroboscopic photo of a figure in motion."

Visual artist Sikander weighs in with different heads of the Gandhara period, homing in on a 7th-8th century Vishnu perhaps from Thailand. "The human face is indeed one of the most powerful and unique visuals, transcending time, race and age," he raves.

Dancer-choreographers Chandralekha and Malavika Sarukkai chose a copper alloy Shiva Nataraja (Lord of the Dance) of the Chola period. Chandralekha queries, "Why did the gods dance?" then answers her own question. "For better comprehension of the form and kinetics." Sarukkai talks of "the cosmic dancer, his face radiant with serenity and the energy of cosmic activity in the cycle of 'mahakal' or eternal time", which is also referred to by Mehta.

While defining the central theme of the artworks in Conversations with Traditions, Sheikh, who studied history at Delhi and later took her MFA in 1971 from the Faculty of Fine Arts in Vadodara, says, "there is something common to Shahzia and me-an entire generation and the political partition of our countries apart. That is our seeking language and history through techniques and mediums of the miniatures traditions of our countries." She adds: "I do not engage in the intricacy of the miniature painting traditions for myself. I am interested in the intimacy that the format suggests, the layering of the surface, quality of color and line, and in the idea that ornamental structure is not antagonist to self-expression in the contemporary context."

A significant year for Nilima Sheikh was 1984 when she created 12 tempera paintings of Champa (not the real name), a young acquaintance who was born in a working class family and was married when she was still a minor, and allegedly, her husband's family killed her barely a year later. Sheikh used the "dowry death episodes" in the early '80s to poignantly portray the 12 miniatures from a carefree girl on her bicycle to one threatened by in-laws and later succumbing to torture.

Sheikh has had shows in the UK, Germany, Johannesburg, Brisbane, Australia and was a student of leading artist and teacher K.G. Subramanyan in Vadodara. Husband Gulam Mohammad Sheikh is also an artist. For the first time, her artwork is on display in New York.

The works of Sikander, who studied at National College in Lahore and got her MFA from Rhode Island School of Design in America, explore the role of women in South Asian societies and draw on Indian miniature paintings pushing the boundaries of both style and tradition. She has displayed her works at Hirshhorn Museum in Washington DC, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art in Kansas City, Renaissance Society, Chicago and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. Currently, Sikander is experimenting and developing work in digital media. She also paints and makes prints.

If you haven't been to Asia Society in a while, now is the time: the new space is also a place to hang out if you are artistically inclined or if you wish to have a quiet meal with like-minded people or need intellectual stimulation in the form of a seminar, a film or perhaps a performance.

The store too now has a new look with more variety of interesting merchandise for the Asia lover.