The Second Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art exhibition catalogue (APT2)

1990 has been of paramount importance to artists' thinking in recent years. The violence, fear and fierce energy of the riots in 1992-93 is often cited as a catalyst for a change of direction in the work of contemporary artists. Some have chosen to explore the relationship between spiritual myths and violence. Others have eschewed any hint of specific religious references in their work. Allusions to political threat have also crept into the art works. In addition, many artists, musicians, writers, actors and film-makers have been actively involved in an organisation called SAHMAT-the Sadfar Hashmi Memorial Trust, set up to emphasise the importance of peace and uphold the values of secularism and cultural pluralism. Exhibitions, performances and concerts are held across India on a regular basis in order to raise awareness of these issues. The spirit of this Asia-Pacific Triennial, as I have understood it, is to reflect the art that is most relevant at this particular time in the region. Its role is to present individual artists, juxtapose them with one another, take heed of national identity, but not be bound by it. It is an exhibition where the artist's voice is paramount and strong, so that common threads will emerge between artists from different countries, but will not be predetermined by artificial or nebulous themes. Layers of artistic activity, fluidity of definitions and multiple perceptions will be revealed. Images, voices and gestures that are both resistant and independent characterise the work from India. As India's first representation in the Asia-Pacific Triennial 3 , the artists were chosen within the context of the Indian situation outlined above, and the aims of the Triennial. Selected from a field of fifty artists viewed by Kamala Kapoor and myself, these five artists, who are established and well– respected within India, make work that stands up in any context in terms of quality and intellectual rigour, displaying an exceptionally well-formulated sense of self. The group of works also reflects recent shifts in contemporary Indian art practice, both in terms of the emergence of installation art and the sensitivity to political events. They have not been gathered together as representative of contemporary Indian art and, to that end, are not being exhibited as a group. The selection of works addresses a central concern: the options of continuity and disjuncture in the context of the pervading nature of traditions within India (including modernism), and the fragmented realities of daily life (made more complex by India's renewed openness to the West). The work of Mrinalini Mukherjee and N.N. Rimzon may be seen as more continuous than not with the principles of modernism and display a passion for the monumental forms in ancient Indian and European architecture and sculpture. Mukherjee's flowing and compelling folds, while allowing the eye to roam, make manifest a time-consuming accumulation of labour-intensive knots, suggestive of counting and waiting. Rimzon combines the images of the sword, the house, and the pot, positing metaphors of violence against home, labour against spiritual belief. The painted tent of Nilima Sheikh also functions in the spirit of continuity, in her case with Eastern and miniature– painting traditions. Sheikh's paintings of wandering minstrels oscillate between miniature and massive forms. Viewer and artist take a journey together through these saturated scrolls of imagery, and our sense of space is softly altered, turned topsy-turvy by perspectival references, oblique angles and dense references. Vivan Sundaram and Nalini Malani, on the other hand, create works that use the principle of disjuncture, accumulating a fragmented and eclectic visual language to create meaning. Sundaram reveals a powerful, perhaps repressed, narrative of contemporary reality, addressing concepts of impermanence and travel beneath the mask of post-minimalism. Malani uses watercolour as a metaphor for transgression, transition and fluidity in contemporary society, depicting images of disenfranchised groups in her district of Lohar Chawl. Artists, curators and museums carefully construct exhibition spaces and aesthetic tableaus around which the viewer is invited to journey. Nevertheless, each visitor will experience this exhibition in an individual way. Some will travel in one direction encountering this or that; others will take a different route. In India, there are always options for the direction one takes, a varied pace at which one can perform a task, and many points of view-firmly and loudly expressed-with which one can agree or disagree. The physical and spatial presence of these art works will, we hope, provide the visitor with a cultural experience that is as multifaceted as the romantic icon is holistic. Victoria Lynn is Curator, Contemporary Art, at TheArt Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney,Australia. 1 Mary Nooter Roberts in Chris MOiier, Susan Vogel and Mary Nooter Roberts, Exhibition-ism: Museums andAfrican Art, The Museum for African Art,New York, 1994,p.34. Ivan Karp, in Chris MOiier et al.,p.41. An exhibition of contemporary Indian urban and tribal artwas held atThe Art Gallery of New South Wales, SydneY, Australia in 1993. Entitled 'IndiaSongs, Multiple Streams in Contemporary Indian Art', it also toured throughout New South Wales and to the Australian CapitalTerritory, Australia. Nalini Malani,Mrinalini Mukherjee,N.N. Rimzon,Nilima Sheikh and Vivan Sundaram are the artists from India included in the Second Asia-PacificTriennial 1996. (India was not represented in the firstTriennial.) 1996 Curatorial Team: Victoria Lynn,Rhana Devenport, and Kamala Kapoor, adistinguished critic and writer livingand working in Bombay, India 48 I CURATORIAL ESSAYS: SOUTH AND SOUTH-EAST ASIA Top Mrinalini Mukherjee Pushp (The flower) 1993 Hemp 102x125x82cm Collection:The artist Middle Nguyen Xuan Tiep's studio, Hanoi, during curatorial visit, 1995 Bottom Nguyen Xuan Tiep Song of the buffalo boys II 1990 Oil on canvas 85x120cm Collection: Queensland Art Gallery. The Kenneth and Yasuko Myer Collection of Contemporary Art