Efforts to bring closer the two cultural powerhouses from Asia

The global marketplace is getting reshaped by the tastes and demands of Chinese collectors, who are making informed decisions driven by their own cultural lineage rather than blindly taking a cue from the West, as the Features section essay of this edition emphasizes.

Importantly, there is now a wider interest in Indian art among the Chinese collectors even though they are more passionate about their ‘home-grown’ art. They are equally keen to check where Indian art stands vis-a-vis Chinese art. Senior specialist (Asian contemporary art) at Christie’s Hong Kong, Ingrid Dudek, reveals: “We’ve witnessed an increasing amount of cross-fertilization and pan-Asian bidding and buying over the last several seasons.”

According to the expert, Chinese buyers have shown particular interest since 2006, when the auction house started to include top pieces from Indian artists alongside work from their contemporaries across Asia. For them, contemporary Indian art probably is of significance because of the comparable circumstances artists from both the countries face today, like cultural and aesthetic history coupled with the fast modernization, leading to an intense search for a distinct artistic identity and vision within that realm. Incidentally, prices of contemporary
Chinese art have zoomed up in comparison to Indian art.

To further enhance the cultural collaboration, the Shanghai Biennale initiated an elaborate project in order to make the people of China view India with a fresh eye and perspective. The aim of ‘West Heavens’ was to reshape their imagination about India. From Mumbai to Shanghai via Sardar Sarovar and The Three Gorges was a journey Tushar Joag embarked upon on a motorcycle. He named it ‘Rocinante’, after Don Quixote’s horse.

Atul Bhalla opted to connect recent historical sites on the verge of being forgotten, within site of inner Shanghai, as a ‘Listener’: to water, to streams, harbors, rivers, canals, wells etc. Anant Joshi’s work was based on cultural icons and architectural monuments like the Gateway of India in Mumbai, or the Zhengyangmen in Beijing. Gigi Scaria’s installation included two parallel projections - selected archival images about Mahatma Gandhi and Mao Zedong. Simultaneously, a series of lecture-forums engaged renowned Indian and Chinese scholars in a dialogue.

Clearly, now more conscious efforts are being made to bring together the two cultural powerhouses from Asia.