How art is connected with the new aspiring modern society

Having closely been associated with top artists and galleries, the author of ‘Artist, Undone’ V.Sanjay Kumar, is able to weave frailties of human nature and emotions into perplexing ways of the art world.

Sharp, rough, and written with biting candor, the book comes across as a beguiling narrative of one man’s understanding of the creation, the commerce and the critiquing of contemporary art. It is also a montage of lives changed – mauled, redefined and occasionally redeemed – by it.

‘Artist, Undone’ makes succinct observations on our perceptions of art. For example, Harsh Sinha quips at one point: ‘People buy art for aesthetics, for vanity, for pomp, for splendor, for peer-level masturbation, for a lark, to try to belong, to make money, because they can’t say no, because they can’t stop, because for a public rush of blood, for the rush that possession gives, for nostalgia, for the sheer joy of buying…’

Maintaining the fine line between non-fiction and fiction has been a challenging, albeit fascinating experience for V. Sanjay Kumar (the Director of Sakshi Gallery) whom Geetha Mehra describes as a valued colleague, while applauding his ability to skillfully weave events around the domain of art through recognizable and some purely fictional characters.

It’s difficult to write about art sans any visuals about art, hence the concept of infusing images in account, explains the author, who reveals in an interview: “I want people to come into the art world and just be what they are, and to have their freedom, to be fearless in terms of how they respond, to find themselves, so to speak, by looking at the art world. That’s the crux of the book, how people find themselves by exploring the art world.”

The idea is not to get judgmental about them, but to let people make up their own perspective and experience. As the pieces shift and fit in the kaleidoscopic jigsaw of the confused and cunning characters, the novelist elucidates how art is closely connected with the new aspiring class of modern Indian society, viscerally tied to real life vicissitudes.