After an opening ceremony with short speech by guest speakers for the event – artist/art writer Madan Chitrakar, artist and radio presenter Chirag Bangdel, actress Manisha Koirala, musician Nirakar Yakthumba, freelance writer Pranab Man Singh – and a short statement by the artist himself along with a poetry recital, the exhibition opened with everyone flying a balloon with the yellow tag of “let’s talk about ART baby” attached to it.[break]
“Sophistication in art is good but too much sophistication that makes art inaccessible is not,” opined Bangdel at the opening. Chitrakar’s objective for the whole campaign itself has been to make art more accessible and clear the misconception that art is not just elitist or too hard to understand.
Termed as a collaborative solo, from the series of ARTivities, Chitrakar uses different iconic paintings and images from other artists, photographers and his own, amalgamating them with his thoughts spelled out in speech bubbles as he fantasizes that people are “aware and talking about arts.”
For one of his big scale paintings, he uses Min Bajracharya’s iconic image of Durga Pokhrel cheering for democracy during the 1990 revolution and instead of democracy the moment is captured as a cheer for ARTocracy as the bubble reads “Kalatantra Jindabaad”.
“Sujan had asked my permission to use my photograph almost 5 years back and as I see it now, I feel so happy and proud to have contributed to his work. He has revived my photograph with a new message without any tampering,” says Bajracharya.
In his other painting, he uses Ashok Shakya’s photograph of a man carrying a painting where instead of the original eyes of Buddha, he has used Picasso’s Guernica. Suvani Singh, co-founder of Quixote’s cove bookshop, now the proud owner of the painting says, “I had been hearing all good things about Sujan’s work for a year and more and his works definitely go beyond what I had heard”
After seeing the paintings, Aman Adhikary, telivision presenter and Chitrakar’s friend says, “I like the idea that you don’t have to be an expert on art to appreciate it and acknowledge the hard work put into it, and Sujan’s paintings here is an example to that.”
Art lecturer, Nabendra Limbu comments that the paintings are evidence of Chitrakar’s love and passion for art as his message gets through to all that art should be talked about and accessible to all. With all of his paintings, Chitrakar gives the viewers more to talk about on art. For instance, in his painting of a busy street with a speech bubble that reads, “You bought a Manuj Babu” the viewers will want to learn who is Manuj Babu and why is he an icon.
“The whole campaign is not about having people talk about my exhibition or my art, if it remains to only that then it’s a failure, because, for me this is about having people talk about art in general,” Chitrakar said.
ARTivist Chitrakar, definitely had people talking at his well attended opening day with his paintings of the same old familiar places and local motifs but presented in a unique way and with a pressing message.
As more viewers get to see the exhibition that is open till January 27, it is expected that not just the art savvy crowd present at the event but the whole city and the general public will be talking about ART.
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