KOCHI:
Chinese and Indian artists both hail from unbroken artistic traditions and can play an important role in bridging the divide between tradition and modernity in the contemporary world, according to artists and scholars participating in the ongoing Kochi-Muziris Biennale (KMB) here.
“Questions of what is tradition and what is modernity seem like clichés now but not for people in India and China who have been preoccupied with these concepts for centuries. From this Biennale, I feel I can get something to help me address these questions,” Prof. Lydia Liu, Director for the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society at Columbia University, said.
She was speaking at a discussion on Sunday between five Chinese participating artists that took its cue from KMB 2016 curator Sudarshan Shetty’s vision, which seeks to address the question, “What does it mean to be together in time—to be contemporary?
Prof. Liu referred to the work by Tianjing-based artist Yang Hongwei who has created a 12 metre long scroll with traditional Chinese paper and ink to create a fantastical fictional world that examines the way discussion on sexuality and society’s associated problems has been shut out of China’s historical narrative. Hongwei is renowned for pushing the boundaries of traditional Chinese printmaking and woodcarving.
Beijing-based Ouyang Jianghe has penned a poem Tears of the Taj Mahal in a calligraphic style on a hanging scroll. Dai Xiang, also from Beijing, is exhibiting a work ‘The New Along the River During the Qingming Festival’ that is inspired by a famous 12th Century Song dynasty work by artist Zhang Zeduan.
“Ouyang’s poem, done on traditional Chinese paper in calligraphy, teaches me something about tradition. I get ideas on how to approach materials, instruments, or inscriptions just by looking at something he has done. It does tell me something about the contemporary world. Similarly, Hongwei’s work looks from a distance like a traditional scroll but up close you find icons and details from contemporary Chinese tradition,” Prof Liu said.
Xiang borrows from the visual framework of the original to depict politically charged subjects, portraying contemporary society in China – ranging from law enforcers, prostitutes, to vendors, farmers and tourists etc. The 25m-long panoramic photographic scene digitally sewn together portrays the conflict between the imported culture of the west and the local traditions since the opening of the Chinese society in the late 1970s and the ‘80s.
“I wanted to think about the resources I could take from the traditional works and rethink them in my work,” Xiang said.
‘Walking Out of Bayan Har’, a massive 121.5 metre by 1.88 metre tall scroll painting by the late Chinese artist Li Bo’an stretched out at the historic Kottapuram Fort in Thrissur district – one of the 12 venues of the Biennale, combines the Chinese art forms of long scroll painting, mural painting, the ink and wash and portraiture.
“It is truly a masterpiece and unlike the western concept of art introduced by artists like Duchamp etc., it dignifies and redefines humanity. In the entire 20th Century, these questions of tradition and modernity have not been solved and I think that only Chinese and Indian artists can come up with satisfying answers to these questions,” Chinese scholar Li Tuo said.
According to Jianghe, there is a tradition of realism in portraying the daily lives of people throughout the history of Chinese painting.
“The problem with modernism today is that it tends to be more diverse and less complex and the different artworks end up more and more like each other,” he said.
