India Art Fair is Bigger Than Ever, Urging the World to Look at Us

The most exciting part about this year’s India Art Fair is that the focus is primarily on the subcontinent.

It’s the fifth most attended fair in the world – with 100,000 people thronging to Delhi’s NSIC Grounds over four days for a hearty dose of art.

Since 2008, India Art Fair (IAF) has kickstarted the capital’s cultural calendar by showcasing the length and breadth of contemporary art practised all over the world. Yet, the eighth edition of the fair promises to be a little different from the previous ones.

IAF 2016 has in store a series of firsts. There is a new programme called Platform to showcase young emerging artists, art spaces and collectives from Southeast Asia. An inaugural film programme dedicated to cutting edge film and video art, curated by Shai Heredia, filmmaker and director of Experimenta. An exclusive new space called Collectors’ Lounge hosted by BMW – the fair’s presenting partner. A fresh set of art awards to laud the best of Indian contemporary artists; and a public art initiative by DLF.

A Slew of Fresh Names

The list of galleries has been narrowed down to 70, from 85 last year, in a bid to focus on quality.

We have invested in honing the roster of galleries we work with and collaborating more closely with them. We want to really take responsibility for what the fair presents to its audiences.

Zain Masud, international director, IAF

The list includes 18 new participants such as Grey Noise from Dubai, Jeddah’s Hafez Gallery, Edel Assanti from London, Madrid-based Sabrina Amrani and Hosfelt Gallery from San Francisco.

Added to the list are also participants from Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Pakistan, who will showcase their work as part of the Platform programme.

Some of these have never been showcased at any art fair before. When someone comes from the West, this is not something he or she will see in London or Paris.

Zain Masud

The focus is very much on South Asia this year – wanting to showcase to the rest of the world a region that is not always accessible.

This Year’s Grand Focus: The Subcontinent

Besides a scintillating Speakers Forum, the fair will offer a brand new space – IAF Atrium – for performances, talks and book launches. One of the sessions to look forward to is the one on ‘Edible Maps’ by Delfina Foundation’s Politics of Food programme.

Another interesting one is a conversation between two women artists from Pakistan – Lala Rukh and Ayesha Jatoi – on how their art draws from traditional music, philosophy and nature.

For those interested in architecture, here is a rare opportunity to hear Martino Stierli, chief curator of architecture at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, discuss Le Corbusier’s legacy in India and modernist architecture in non-western contexts.

One will also get to see the BMW Art Car designed by Cesar Manrique in 1990. This is part of the BMW Art Car Project, which was introduced by French race car driver Herve Poulain in 1975. Since then, a total of 17 such Art Cars have been created.

Clearly, IAF has not just whetted the international appetite for Indian work but also resulted in a democratisation of art. People who were earlier too intimidated to even step into a gallery are today engaging freely with art.

The big gap in India has been in the community outreach – how do we address that community through the arts? This is what the fair is doing at both a local community and international level.

Tasneem Mehta, managing trustee and honorary director, Bhau Daji Lad Museum, Mumbai

Neha Kirpal, founder director of IAF, maintains that access and education – the founding objectives of the fair – will continue to hold in the years to come.

“It’s not a job for any one stakeholder alone. The fair thrives on these partnerships and corporate collaborations. The idea is to find and establish these collaborations and to make a long term plan, to the point where the government also can recognise the value of the arts in India,” she says.

(The India Art Fair 2016 will be held between January 29 to 31 at the NSIC Grounds, Okhla, New Delhi. A special VIP preview (by invitation) will be held on January 28.)

(Avantika Bhuyan is a freelance journalist who loves to uncover the invisible India hiding in nooks and crannies across the country.)