The objective of this workshop Renewed Intensity was to reach out to the urban mass in a meaningful manner, involving the public and their useful connect in Art

 

B.K.College of Art and Crafts, is an art institution that is responsible to bring innovative curriculum into art education in Odisha. Along with art education it has considerably propagated art in the state and beyond. The college is celebrating its Silver Jubilee on the completion of 25 years of its inception in the state. To commemorate this event, a national workshop on Public art and Site Specific art was curated by Jagannath Panda, alumni of the college and illustrious artists of Odisha.  

The objective of this workshop Renewed Intensity was to reach out to the urban mass in a meaningful manner. Many such attempts are made in recent years, involving the public and their useful connect in art, but here, Bhubaneswar is approached with intent to interact rather than reach out alone by artists those, in some way, relate to the situation. The approach was to evolve and propagate providing the continuum in mind to mind overplaying the skill. Renewed intensity is all about focusing on the creative passion and commitment to art by the artists, who once were trained here and practiced art in the national and international forum. They are purposefully brought back to their home (Odisha), re-inventing themselves and re-locating their art in the changed situation.             

The participants of the workshop focused on the collective ideology in expressing the content of theme in context. Paribartan Mohanty, Pratik Sagar were invited to the workshop while the BKCAC alumni was represented by Anjan Kumar Sahoo, Helen Brahma, Kanta Kishore Moharana, Nityananda Ojha, Sudarshan Biswal, Sujit Mallick, Sambit Panda and Veejayant Dash. 

Anjan Sahoo proposed a site specific work on the eternal journey: a physical transformation with help of clay pots, 108 in number, defining the sahatsra ghatak [pots] with filled water as sent that passes through to attain moksha while Nityanand presented the search for a golden bone referring to simultaneous death of two artists few years back, one at Bhubaneswar and other at Baroda. The memory and pathos were compared quite near to the rituals with incense sticks put around the grave.  

Helen Brahma intelligently dealt with a subject on woman nexalites titled `surrender’ that clearly reflected the psychological and physical torture leading to surrender of the self and the male counterpart. The happiness of the familial unity is mentioned in undertone. Kanta Kishore Moharana’s incarnation was a video projection/presentation, allowing the public to pass through the light on screen emphasizing the internal body matter reflected in projection, thereby re-inventing the human body, few subjects with designated choreography.                       

Sudarshan Biswal and Veejayant Dash performed public art on Green devastation [Rickshaw] and once there was a true respectively. Both of them caught the public attention by motivating common man through participatory dialogue. Sudarshan’s concern of conversion of farm land to growing property enclosure and the harmonic disorder found effective viewers while Veejayant had a radical and direct message. Tree or no tree, infrastructure and life, both are need of time. His concern focused on planning rather than preaching lone. A truncated tree space in form allowed the public to pass through and experience the space-form relationships. Sambit presented a chappal, common man’s footwear pressed against defined garbage, including housefly. House fly is a common fault finder and thus ignored in life. His concern of `can me follow’ seems meaningful through philosophical transformation of the subject. Sujit Mallick, a young artist was a little shy for his appearance in public was for the first time. But he carried a dynamic subject, `hati ne ghoda ne mo pehenkali bajei de’, reflecting the mood of a village shrine and its durative terracotta horse and elephants, commonly found in Orissa and inspires people to forget the communal bias that divide people.    

The guest artist Pratik Sagar has successfully experimented in site specific art in the past and his work True sad space God was just another trial in the continuity. The most interesting part lies in his in-definitive result, which increases the curiosity. He tried to definitive/predictable this time involving natural interception. Paribartana Mohanty’s imagery based on a novel titled `Dasyu’. The composition is a transformation of verbal to visual-re-looking at the city that has grown up to the day. The characters, infrastructures, mentality of city as one of the character have witnessed the change-a critical depiction.                     

The evening of 25th January was devoted to a critical discussion and presentation by artists. All the participants presented themselves through video art, art documentation in AV and announcing their concept. The artist presentation began with initiator Dr. Pradosh Mishra briefly questioning the curator of workshop Jagannath Panda about the origin of concept and its transformation in the urban context. Prof. Deba Patanik, a veteran literature and art connoisseur discussed the public and site specific art in the global context. Dr. Ramkrishna Vedala, Shri Ramhari Jena and Adwaita Gadanayak presented their views on the emerging art trends and local adaptability. The public-artist interaction was ably coordinated and initiated by Dr. Pradosh Mishra introducing the local young artists to a fresh mode.  

The young artists assisting the participants were felicitated by alumni BKCAC, while Prof. Deba Patanik did the honor. The AlumniBKCAC also handed over a contributory amount of Rs.5000/- to Shri Ashok Das(class-3 employee at B.K.Art college) who is undergoing treatment after a heart surgery. Shri Subrat Mallick, the secretary AlumniBKCAC presented the formal vote of thanks. The workshop was coordinated by Dr. Pradosh Mishra, Ashok Nayak (Ashok Art Gallery, New Delhi), Sudarsan Biswal, Veejayant Dash, and Anjan Kumar Sahoo. The workshop was supported by the Foundation for Indian Contemporary Art, Gallery Sanskriti , Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi and stage sponsored by Ashok Art Gallery, HYTONE and Immagery. The event continued from 20th to 27th January 2010 at the Lalit Kala, Regional Centre, Kharvela Nagar, Bhubaneswar.

The Ashok Art Gallery is internationally known for one of its most important holdings: more than 2000 major works by the world's most significant Artists.Over the past years, as Ashok Art Gallery has become a major centre for contemporary visual art, the Gallery has built a strong collection of contemporary work of different artists, became a sponsor of the STANDUP-SPEAKOUT Artshow, Organized by Art Of Living Foundation and United Nations.Organized an International Contenmporary Art Exhibition including artists from USA, The Nederlands, Pakistan and India.We have also participated at Art Expo India Mumbai and India Art Summit Delhi

Review: Commentary in Three Dimensions by Himali Singh Soin

KANTA KISHORE MOHARANA

Ashok Art Gallery

D-1/31, Rear Portion, Model Town-II, 110009 New Delhi, India

December 11, 2009 - January 11, 2010

Eerily realistic, thought-provoking, rebellious and skillfully crafted: Kanta Kishore Moharana’s mixed-media installations refreshingly bridge conceptualism and formalism, birthing work whose message is embossed within the geometry of the marble, fibre, and bronze of which it is made.

The magic of Moharana’s works is its uncanny realism despite his use of permanent, heavy materials to depict that which is perishable, light, and functional. He sculpts, for example, newspapers from marble—an everyday, perishable item made permanent, heavy—and chisels out real headlines to shape a commentary on society’s ills: words literally ‘set in stone.’ In ‘Restoration,’ he carves a cardboard box being eaten by cockroaches from marble. The weightless, disposable quality of paper and cardboard is ironically effaced by its own depiction as the artist crafts immovable objects from perishable subjects.

This confrontation of our conventional perception of material objects urges the viewer to come closer. But this is an online exhibition, thus hindering the interested from really finding the desired detail in form. Kanta Kishore remarkably does not see this as a disadvantage. “I think it makes my work universal,” he says, “and accessible worldwide.” His background is humble: born to a family of stone carvers in Orissa, he has learned form and technique from his forefathers, yet injected his own ideas to appropriate the work into today’s socio-political and artistic context.

Kanta Kishore’s work with marble is not a traditional sculptural practice that mimics reality. Instead, he utilizes other media to make installations that comment directly on poverty, globalization, exploitation, hunger, and revolution. In his piece, ‘Exploitation,’ Kanta Kishore presents tiny bronze men who are trampled by a giant, red, 6-foot long, ornamented, Arabian shoe. The bright scarlet shoe comments on our contemporary classist society, on capitalism’s fissures in distribution, and on the inhumane manner in which workers, children and adults are treated. Compositionally, each element is carefully balanced in geometry, size, space, weight, color and concept. The specifically Arabian identity of the shoe, however, also implies a potentially provocative interpretation of crowds trodden under the force of the Muslim world.

“There are two aspects in nature:/ The perishable and the imperishable./ All life in this world belongs to the former;/ The unchanging element belongs to the later,” says the Bhagvat Gita. In flipping our perceptions of that which is permanent and that which is temporary, Kanta Kishore provokes us to think more deeply about the meaning and importance of the Absolute in a cruelly relativist world.

-- Himali Singh Soin

(Images from top to bottom: Raw Vision 3; Truth 1; Exploitation. All images courtesy of Ashok Art Gallery and the artist.)

SOURCE: Art Slant


The Ashok Art Gallery is internationally known for one of its most important holdings: more than 2000 major works by the world's most significant Artists.Over the past years, as Ashok Art Gallery has become a major centre for contemporary visual art, the Gallery has built a strong collection of contemporary work of different artists, became a sponsor of the STANDUP-SPEAKOUT Artshow, Organized by Art Of Living Foundation and United Nations.Organized an International Contenmporary Art Exhibition including artists from USA, The Nederlands, Pakistan and India.We have also participated at Art Expo India Mumbai and India Art Summit Delhi

Kanta Kishore has picked the popular slum with a different perspective that essentially deals with the core of the subject

KANTA KISHORE

Slums in Neighbourhood

Artists are exploring new media and techniques to convince the viewer in the present day. The range of subjects that the artist deals with today is intriguing and relevant. Indian art seems to have transformed from modesty to market and the journey has been interesting too. The turning points of art here depend heavily on the attitude of the artists and what we have noticed is the increase in the intellectual input with passing time. This has carried us forward from the agreement of the narratives in mythology and epics to negotiating society to human awareness of several factors. Our surrounding and social concerns have always motivated us to a new high. Kanta Kishore is no exception.

Kanta Kishore has picked the popular slum with a different perspective that essentially deals with the core of the subject. The effort by the dwellers to construct the beautiful and magnificent in the city remains in the most neglected part of the earth. Their struggle for existence depend on adversities of life and in the process, they sometimes smile up to their success, which is rare, and rest of the times, lament over their survival. In all these conditions, a pair of sleepers perhaps allows them to retain the honour of human while addressing the rough patches leading to life. The chaos of arrangement also depicts the lifestyle of people inhabit. However high or low they might go individually but collectively they remain intact to the nails that bind them to the ground. The insiders story of constructing a world imagined for the other rightly develop the concept of living.

The composition has deliberately caught our concern for the slum and its dwellers. The symbolic is apparent, expressive and transformed; it suggests the simplest of material in high coordination with installation art. The painting complements to the installation by making it look obvious and illustrative. Kanta Kishore has seemingly taken a defensive position in portraying the subject though several aggressive pointers are available to us. The approach to the subject is worth admiration. The awareness to uplift the downtrodden needs more application both politically and socially. The change is coming at a slow pace and it would appear significantly in future. The makeover through the artistic expression is to the concern is remarkable.
Sculpture Review by Dr. Pradosh Kumar Mishra(Art Hostorian)
Watch out for this growing talent in Art Expo India: Kantakishore Moharana


The Ashok Art Gallery is internationally known for one of its most important holdings: more than 2000 major works by the world's most significant Artists.Over the past years, as Ashok Art Gallery has become a major centre for contemporary visual art, the Gallery has built a strong collection of contemporary work of different artists.
Last year we became a sponsor of the STANDUP-SPEAKOUT Artshow, Organized by Art Of Living Foundation and United Nations.Organized an International Contenmporary Art Exhibition including artists from USA, The Nederlands, Pakistan and India.We have also participated at Art Expo India 2008 Mumbai and India Art Summit 2008 New Delhi.

Sculptural presentation of young Kanta Kishore

Kanta Kishore was born and continued his childhood in a traditional carver(maharana) family near Bhubaneswar, Orissa. His father, elder brothers all are related with artistic work for their livelihood. From his childhood Kanta kishore has played with carving tools , wood and other materials. Practicing sculptures is only job from childhood; he has played with many more different mediums to create different sculptures. He has got a bachelors degree in Fine Art from B.K.College of Art and Crafts and studied master degree at Govt. College of Art and Crafts Kolkata. At his time at Kolkata, he has experimented with different local mediums with his own concepts and got appreciated among all his contemporary sculptors. Now a days he is mostly fascinated towards social issues, human daily life related problems, like urbanization and globalization.

Artist is realizing this problem of society because he/she is a element of base not that glorifying supper structures. Mother feeding, women violence, labor rally , child labor, starvation, unemployment and recent terrorist activities in Indian social life etc. are the sculptural presentation of Kanta Kishore. If you see his conceptual works on news paper series, everybody just falling in love at first sight, He is mastered in carving and when he picks marbles, it produces some wonderful pieces. Now a days he is working on books , carving white marbles and adding some metal to it, those are just lovable.

In this lovely medium Marble, Kanta kishore has started with News Paper series and then got some installations on Labor Rally, by installing carved marble chapels at Tina Ambani’s Harmony Show 2007 he expressed his concern on this social issue. Besides his skill in Marble, he has worked in many different materials like wood, granite, fiber and bronze. His work gives situational thoughts, one of his news paper series shows child labor and other with other issue, it’s just like reminding you everyday about these social issues and it will eradicate only if society will come up.

When his works were exhibited at New Delhi this year at India Habitat Centre, art lovers and critics were just got surprised, everybody puzzled, asked many questions about how many days it has taken and how much patience you have etc. Then his work ‘Golden Chili’ was the centre of attraction at Ashok Art Gallery’s stall in Art Expo India 2008 Mumbai. Kanta Kishore is a very talented young Indian sculptor; you can see his recent original works on display at India Art Summit 2008.

The Ashok Art Gallery is internationally known for one of its most important holdings: more than 2000 major works by the world's most significant Artists.Over the past years, as Ashok Art Gallery has become a major centre for contemporary visual art, the Gallery has built a strong collection of contemporary work of different artists. Last year we became a sponsor of the STANDUP-SPEAKOUT Artshow, Organized by Art Of Living Foundation and United Nations.Organized an International Contenmporary Art Exhibition including artists from USA, The Nederlands, Pakistan and India.We have also participated at Art Expo India 2008 Mumbai and India Art Summit 2008 New Delhi.