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Ten Glorious Years: The Saga of Kashi

Kashi Art Gallery, Kochi celebrates its tenth anniversary on 15th December 2007, with a major group show of the artists who have been associated with Kashi since its inception. JohnyML traces the history and growth of Kashi Art Gallery.

Kochi, erstwhile Cochin used to be known as the ‘Queen of Arabian Sea’. The exotic imageries that market the tourism potential of Kerala still portray Kochi as the ‘Queen’ with its ‘Chinese Fishing Nets’ against an evening sky where the setting sun plays with innumerable colors from nature’s palette and the ‘House Boats’ that offer five star living facilities sprinkled with indigenous tastes of a rustic cuisine. But for the art lovers in India, Kochi is no longer an exotic word. It has been replaced with the name of an art gallery, Kashi. When there is a show at the Kashi Art Gallery, Indian art scene harks to the vibes that it creates. From a humble beginning Kashi has grown into an indispensable establishment in the art map of India and this year Kashi celebrates its tenth birth anniversary with a huge group show titled ’10 Light Years’ with all those artists who have been associated with the gallery from its inception to now.

The tenth anniversary of the Kashi Art Gallery becomes important as it could contribute immensely to create the art hub of Kerala in Kochi. To create this art hub, Kashi braved all odds, from the Kerala artists’ innate aversion for anything that sells (an outdated radical policy inherited from the predominant left wing ideology prevailed in Kerala), the complacent and decadent aesthetic inclination of the middle class to the sado-masochist interest of the typical Kerala artist to live in abject penury, anarchy and an unmindful parasite-ism. For Anoop Scaria and Dorrie Younger, now the well-known couple who run the Kashi Art Gallery, establishing the name of the gallery was not an easy task against this milieu. Perhaps, Anoop’s experience as an organizer with a lot of pronounced romanticism and Dorrie’s inherent ability to manage an organization provided a successful formula that dispelled the doubts and the narcissistic cynicism from the minds of the Kerala artists in due course of time.

When Anoop and Dorrie started Kashi Art Café in Fort Kochi in 1997, there was no sign of art market in Kerala. India had opened up its doors and windows for the global market economy to come in and many of the artists were vehemently against the globalization process. Kashi Art Café’s idea was not to supply fodders for an emerging market, on the contrary its aim was to identify the home grown talents and provide them with a place to exhibit their works. Also Kashi Art Café led a lot of public art projects, which were aimed at bringing the general public’s attention to various forms of art. In Kochi, artist Kaladharan had been already working as a one-man army to initiate the public into the field of art through demonstrations, slide shows, film shows and lectures at Kalapeedhom. However, Kaladharan’s effort found its place outside the economics of art production, dissemination and consumption. Kashi took off from where Kaladharan left. What Kaladharan could not provide to the Kerala artist was the financial support and Kashi could do it, slowly but consistently.

Kashi grew up with the special milieu of Mattanchery, Fort Kochi, where unlike the mainland of Kerala, life flows with a remembered history of colonialism and its resultant multiculturalism. One of the first settlements of the Dutch in Kerala, Fort Kochi still has the remnants from that period, besides having a fast diminishing Jewish population. The architectural and cultural remnants of the past make this place a special tourist attraction. The general population is familiar with the constant presence of foreigners and nobody is viewed through the eyes of segregation. Kashi Art Café became one of the modern addas of the locals as well as of the foreign tourists and the art works exhibited there enthused the visitors. Some of the visitors bought the works and this money gave some kind of impetus to the exhibiting artist. The ‘Kashi initiated’ music, environmental art and performance projects provided the artists with a sense of purpose, in which romantic ideas about art and practicalities of surviving went hand in hand.

Kashi was still not a name to reckon with in the general art scene of India until the early years of the current decade. However, the no-profit-no-loss activities of Kashi went on under the missionary verve of Anoop and Dorrie. It would not be wrong to say that they raised money from the café and used it for promoting art. This couple, though not trained in art or art management cherished the hope that one day their efforts would bring in desired results. Anoop and Dorrie say that they never thought that they would make money from art. But definitely they hoped that one day they would be able to create a happy platform where artists could come, interact, exhibit and of course gain some monetary benefits.

The year 2003 was crucial for Anoop and Dorrie, therefore for the Kashi Art Café. The artists who have come back to settle in Kochi after their studies and also those Kerala born artists who have found their name and fame elsewhere started showing faith towards the activities of Kashi. This selfless support from the artists gave Anoop and Dorrie the courage to establish a proper gallery space two kilometers away from the Art Café. The coffee connection was deleted for the first time and the name Kashi Art Gallery heralded the arrival of a full fledged gallery with a viable financial mode. As an appreciation of their efforts and also as a celebration of Kochi as the ‘would be art hub of Kerala’, Bose Krishnamachari brought his ‘Bombay X 17’ show to the Kashi Art Gallery. This perhaps, changed the scenario not only of Kashi but also of Kerala art scene. Several important shows followed that made Kashi’s fame reach beyond the Sahya Mountain ranges.

‘Bombay X 17’ literally broken down the geographical and locational specifications of Kashi, and it became an ‘Indian’ gallery with noticeable representation of non-Malayali artists in their exhibition itinerary. The general art boom in India was almost like a life saving medicine for many Malayali artists who had either left ‘art’ out of disillusionment or had gone to foreign shores to eke out a living. Now there was a place for them to regroup and gravitate; Kashi. Anoop and Dorrie welcomed the artists with great potentials and purged them of their disillusionment by providing them with solo shows and including their works in the designed group shows. With their Kashi ‘debut’ (re-debut’ to be precise), they became hot names in the general art scene of India, with several gallery majors signing them up for future shows.

Finding adequate studio spaces was still a major problem in Kerala. The attention of Anoop and Dorrie turned to this issue and they together devised a plan to set up studio spaces for working artists. Now Kashi Art Retreat at the Kakkathuruthu Island, around twenty five kilometers from Kochi houses many artists, sculpting, painting and doing other artistic activities. Following this Kashi started month long residencies for young and upcoming artists. Three years back Kashi set up its annual ‘Kashi Award for Visual Arts’ (KAVA) for finding and supporting young talents from all over India. The KAVA award has become one of the prestigious awards conferred upon young artists. Most of the KAVA winners have by now become reckonable names in the Indian art scene.

With ten years of experience in their kitty, Anoop and Dorrie cut a happy and proud picture. There was a time when they had to share the disappointment with the artists and now those times have gone into history. Buyers and art collectors flock in when a Kashi show is announced and most of the works are pre-sold in the shows. That does not go without saying that there are shows that do not generate any money at all. “But we are not worried. The art collectors now are an informed lot. None can impose things on them. Though Kashi’s name gives a lot of leverage to the artist, that does not mean the works need to be sold. If an artist’s works are not sold from Kashi, that does not mean his or her works are bad. It heavily depends on the collector’s taste. We are sure that if not today, tomorrow their works will be noticed by other collectors. We do our public projects also with the same faith. Everything need not convert into money,” say Anoop and Dorrie.

Kashi’s success has spelled magic on other entrepreneurs to gravitate towards Kochi. New galleries have come up in and around Kochi in recent times. Even the lethargic Kerala Lalit Kala Akademy too has waken up to the call of the times by organizing shows and other art activities in its centers, though many of them still do not have any sense of direction. Gallery majors in Mumbai and elsewhere have already planned shows in Kochi in the coming years. May be Kochi is yet to find its own (home grown) major buyers and art collectors but it has become a place for serious collectors and buyers to pick up good works of art. Kashi’s ten years of works have finally brought in positive changes in Kerala’s art scenario. We in www.artconcerns.com wish all the best to Kashi Art Gallery on its 10th Birth Anniversary.