“Since almost all Asian countries are still excluded from the international network of exhibitions and information (in ‘advanced’ countries), most of the artists in Asia have to rely more on the geographical situation of Asia than on mobility and an exchange of information.” (Raiji Kuroda)

Contemporary Indian art carries with it its own baggage and the residue it has within it perhaps does not fit in with the politics of international art. The multi-cultural tapestry of Britain and the melting pot America are looking at Indian art albeit with a limiting ‘gaze’, often conforming it within specific boundaries and indulging in territorial mapping of the contents of the Indian continent as a whole.

Contemporary Indian art being produced within India cannot be unlinked from its own history, which is radically different from the Euro American world. There are intrinsic differences in the histories of nations, even though some may share a colonial past the very concept of modernism and the process of modernism has different meanings for each.

Modern Indian art undeniably was a foreign import. As India moved into the 20th century, “high art” was quite simply the academic realism of Raja Ravi Varma and his many followers- graduates of art schools set up by the British and based on European models of education. The orientalist Bengal school artists then followed them. Modernist visual imagery entered the scene in a tentative way with Gaganendranath Tagore and Rabindranath Tagore and later in a concerted manner in the works of Amrita Sher-gill culminating in the internationalism of the Bombay Progressives. Abstraction then became fashionable in the ‘50s and semi – abstract art which became popular in the ‘70s is still in practice today. It was a period when non-figurative art dominated, a spill over of the global phenomena.

It was the Baroda school of artists who finally broke away from the formalism of the high modern but in spite of traveling and studying at the Western academies contemporary Indian artists remain quite untouched by the conceptual art practices of the West. Figuration still dominates the canvas of Contemporary Indian art, though it is tinged with irony or political overtones.

Artists like M.F. Husain, S.H. Raza and F.N. Souza who formed the core group of Progressives Artists Group emphasized a new conceptual freedom and attempted to break with past orthodoxies. It was an age of individualism influenced primarily by the Expressionist tradition of the west. This inspiration, however, was drawn in a superficial manner. While the Western experience was a result of the trauma of the two world wars, the Indian experience failed to draw upon its own indigenous experience i.e. the Partition.

While Husain , strongly rooted in tradition, reaffirming myths and folk lore and drawing heavily from the indigenous countryside , stayed in touch with the Indian soil, intuitively and spontaneously painting the essence of India, Souza dealt with his own internal erotic tensions and his ambiguous and problematic relation with Catholicism. S.H. Raza who has made France his home ever since he went there in the 50s is primarily a great colorist who still draws on the darkly silent tenacious landscapes of Madhya Pradesh, in Central India, where he spent his initial years of his life. What epitomizes his art is the geometric abstraction which predominates his brilliantly colored canvases.

While Raza and Souza went abroad and established an identity from the ‘outside’ as exiles, Husain worked mainly within India. Sakti Burman too flew the roost and worked from the ‘outside’ but he too could not escape the Indianess in his visual metaphors.

Arpita Singh is one of India’s foremost contemporary painters. In her work a steady progression and change is evident. For some time now she has been using the female body as a metaphor, though her feminism is very different from that of the much younger Rekha Rodwittya who uses the feminine form in a more assertive manner.

Beginning from a base of cubism A. Ramachandran shifted slowly into being essentially a figurative painter. He re-invents myths and has been profoundly influenced by the Kerala temple murals. What makes him distinct is his shift from academic realism to allegorical forms, ornamental motifs and arbitrary chiaroscuro.

Anjolie Ela Menon yet another iconic artist of contemporary Indian art is fashionable, trendy and international yet her colors are representative of the old Byzantine mosaics, and there are flashes of Chinese lacquerware in her oil paintings. Her work, while being quintessentially Indian reeks of a cosmopolitan savoir fare.

Post-seventies India saw a remarkable change in the art world. The art market came into prominence; galleries mushroomed in Delhi, Mumbai, Calcutta, with Chennai and Bangalore. The artists too became conscious of the market forces and accordingly became more or less prolific. The period also saw a return of narrative art, a return of figuration with an Indian essence. Artists started distilling elements from personal experience to create Platonic types that made universal statements.

In the second category are the emerging voices from India. Jitesh Kallat, A Balasubramanium C.Krishnamachari Bose, Baiju Parthan, Shibu Natesan, Nataraj Sharma, K.Murlidharan and Sujata Bajaj are artists who are all well traveled, in touch with the trajectories of the west, yet are re -affirming their post-colonial present. They are the artists of tomorrow, who have used Indian philosophy, folk traditions and Indian history in a very globally accepted style. These emerging artists of India after flirting with post-modern theories and concepts have found their identity in the post-colonial practices. Issues of identity, migration, Diaspora, cross cultural responses, in-betweeness and cultural influence are very much part of their art practices.

The third section includes a mixed bag of artists ranging from the dreamy, ephemeral Suhas Roy, to the heavily erotic images of Laxma Goud. Large full-bodied dark women with large red bindis are emblematic of Thota Vaikuntham’s oeuvre. Paresh Maity stands apart with his brilliant colors while Jayshree Burman with her intricate line drawings and delicately filled colors takes us back to the decorative arts of ancient India. Arpana Caur and Rekha Rodwittya are like chalk and cheese, but when it comes to making a statement they can match each other: Rekha with her strong feminist stance and Arpana with her pre- occupation with the environment, and collaborative work with folk artists, with which she has carved a special niche for herself.

Contemporary Indian artists are breaking many barriers. The Western canon which has been dominating the international art markets, and the western avant-garde has established itself in London and New York. It was but natural for the modern Indian artists to be cast under this spell but no longer today. The younger ‘diasporic’ South Asian artists are challenging this dominance. Eurocentric auction houses like Sotheby’s, Christies and Bonhams are turning their gaze eastwards and are setting up offices in Indian cities and holding auctions of Indian art.

Experimenting with new materials, new mediums, the contemporary Indian artist is at times autobiographical and at times phantasmagoric, but it is the here and the now which is the overriding concern. It is more of social reality, issues of gender, empowerment and relationships. There is a reassertion of cultural identity, and a greater politicization of art. There is also the influence of post -colonial writings and the woman’s movement on art which is becoming increasingly relevant for the contemporary Indian artist. Yet in the body of work whose taxonomy is Indian there is a ‘residue’ of the past which remains.