In a month, we complete a year of Venkatappa Art Gallery (VAG) protests in a month. Black umbrella protests, human chain, occupy Venkatappa, art marathon, whistle protest....the usually quiet art community of Bengaluru was suddenly up in arms about the State Government’s MOUs with corporates to adopt of tourism destinations. Under this pact, their beloved art space in the city, Venkatappa Art Gallery was to be adopted by Tasveer Foundation which planned to build a museum there.
The fact that a democratic space like VAG was being made inaccessible to artists who couldn’t afford expensive galleries was not acceptable to the art fraternity and on March 7, they launched a crusade against the move.
“Had a private space taken over, we would have been asked to get up by now,” says artist Suresh Kumar G. “It has been two hours since the four of us - Sheela Gowda, Suresh and Alaka Rao have been sitting at VAG, discussing the Forum’s journey so far and the roadmap ahead.”
Sheela, Suresh and Alaka are quick to clarify that they are not the sole representatives of the VAG Forum. Formed as a response against the adoption of VAG, artists collectively organised events through the forum.
“I think one of the reasons for our achievement is that it is not formal. There is no rigid structure to it. There is no president, no secretary, no membership. You can join and you can leave. Here everybody participates, give suggestions. There are open debates. So, everyone represents VAG Forum equally,” says Sheela emphasising the reason for the sustenance of their movement.
Their refusal to accept the MoU between Tasveer Foundation and State Ministry of Tourism led the Government to reconsider the pact. “To put up VAG for adoption by the Tourism ministry’s Vision group was very arbitrary. VAG comes under the ministry of Kannada and Culture and not Tourism. This is a fantastic model and we want this model to remain,” says Suresh.
“Anybody can rent this space to exhibit for a minimal amount,” says Suresh.
But the outfit agrees there are some crucial improvements needed to make it better. “Only an artist knows how to upgrade this place. We show around the world so we know and believe me we don’t need crores for it. The place needs very basic things like overhead projectors, improvements of walls, better hanging facilities, lighting, air-conditioning. There is a lot of space being occupied by the administrative staff. That can also be utilised for small exhibitions and space. Why is Roerich’s collection being stored here? Is VAG a storehouse? Venkatappa’s paintings are not properly captioned. There is no proper text. There are these things which need to be looked into. We have given a list of these changes to the Department of Archaelogy. We are going to resume our discussions with the department,” says Sheela.
The Forum says, if last year it was seen as being on a protest mode, this year it will be on a constructive mode. Sambhrama 2017 on February 10 marks the launch of the second phase of VAG Forum. “In Kannada it means celebration and we will celebrate through events every 45 days,” informs Suresh.
Poster exhibitions, lights, exhibition of videos of films on resistance, video art made from the footage of VAG protests, day-long performance marathon will take place between February 10 and February 15. “We will also make dosas one day for each other. There will be dance and music. We also want to unveil a sculpture expressing our gratitude to the media and everyone else who supported us,” adds Suresh, who has been invited to talk about the VAG Forum protests at NGBK, an alternative art space in Berlin on March 29.
Considering the protesters, it is not surprising how creative the protests were. The Forum didn’t want anything normal to express their dissent. “We are creative people so what happened was very natural,” says Alaka explaining their artistic rejection of the proposal through events such as rejection of the memorandum. At the event “We read the MoU. We Reject the MoU. We Recycle the MoU” held on March 27, visitors were asked to recycle the copy of MoU in different ways.
A few months later, artist Parameshwar Jolad drew portraits of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, Industries and Tourism Minister R.V.Deshpande and Kannada and Culture Ministe Umashree at Shivananda Circle seeking funds from the public to raise money for the Government to run the VAG.
The intenational seminar “Mysore Modernity, Artistic Nationalism and the art of K.Venkatappa” curated by Pushpamala N. in November 2016 was another seminal event held in this direction.
“We don't want to run VAG. Our intention is to just save a beautiful public space which was threatened like other public spaces. Governments today very conveniently say that they can’t take care of it. There is no will on their part. We want to preserve these public spaces. I believe there were other spaces too which were being put up for adoption and our protests have kind of paved the way. If we have become catalysts for something positive, we are extremely happy,” says Sheela.
Venkatappa Art Gallery
K.Venkatappa is an important figure in the history of modern Indian art. He studied art under Abanindranath Tagore.
The gallery took a long time to finish and came up in 1971. Interestingly, at that time too, artists disturbed with delays in the construction of the space, had protested.
Besides the collection of paintings and Plaster of Paris bas reliefs of K.Venkatappa, the space also houses the collection of KK Hebbar.
Several contemporary artists like Sheela Gowda, Pushpamala N. started their careers with solo shows at VAG.
