The luxury of private settings in public hotel spaces provides an opportunity to encounter art quite spontaneously. At the Park Hyatt Chennai, inspired by the owners’ textile business, permanent installations on the theme of weaving, spin a narrative through the hotel. A stone relief depicts spinning wheels; hundreds of waffle-weave form collages in monotones. Spools of silky yarn are mesmerising in patterns, colour and texture. These patterns from yarn and cloth subtly showcase Chennai’s position as a textile hub.
In conjunction with Gallery Veda, Park Hyatt Chennai has also had three shows for periods of six months — Wonderland, Deep Skin Deep and now, False Alternatives. Spread over two floors, the gallery environment enters subconsciously to become an overall experience. False Alternatives, curated by Meenakshi Thirukode, allows for the investigation of multiple perceptions between the yardstick of good and evil, through paintings, video art and installations. Artist Sujeeth Kumar Sreekandath takes us back to childhood in his village: without electricity, he discovered in the dark how a jackfruit ripens, by feeling its skin and what it feels like to hold a fistful of grain from bins. Four fragrant pinewood chests invite us to open lids and feel or smell what is inside. This sense of delight in the unexpected revels in Seema Kohli’s tapestry-like rendering of Durga riding a tiger, sitting atop a huge tongue, projecting from the wall. Likewise, a very unusual take by furniture designer and actor Lekha Washington: her War and Piece made of a jumble of dried plants and flowers, juxtaposed with found objects, toy war-tanks, pigs and cows is topped with a rabbit on a clock and an upside-down rooster. Finished in a coat of rust with paint and m-seal, a sense of fossilised decay prevails. Several artists from New York form the repertoire: Jaishri Abichandani’s LED light boxes combine sci-fi and eerie self portraiture to address gender issues, challenging the traditional boundaries of what goes over a table setting in a restaurant. Chippa Sudhakar’s Flying Man in fibreglass and turkey feathers with glowing artificial parts appears like Icarus in the age of technology.
Walking through the recently renovated floors at Raintree St.Mary’s Road, there is a lingering presence of old time values in contemporary settings. A need to make guests at home in impeccable surrounds was implicit in the design brief to architect Jeffrey Wilkes. Raintree’s interiors offer moments of quiet from the busy environs of local industry and art selections reflect on Chennai and the South. A quixotic doorway by artist K.R Santhanakrishnan endears with layered perspectives and an unabashed use of colour. For the main wall of Colony, the multi-cuisine restaurant, Swetha Reddy, executive director of Raintree commissioned AnamikaV. to do an installation. An artist who explores a vast breadth of media, Anamika chose to employ the idea of containment to suit the space. “I wanted to do something with objects to connect with the kitchen and food. I thought of the anjarai petti and also how everything is clearly visible in glass bottles in the kitchen.” Mylapore with its forever-present Aavin Milk Parlour and garland-makers epitomised timeless qualities for her. Employing a tiffin-box manufacturer, Anamika customised cylindrical containers of hardy stainless steel with transparent glass fronts to hold objects.
The playful and variant collection ranges from an old-fashioned stamp pad, goli soda bottle to a ghungroo and even a drishti bommai, preserving all such familiar mementoes for posterity. I draw comparisons to Navarathri golu, where traditionally every object has its special meaning. “Local is global,” says Anamika. “In the night, there is a play of light, a sparkle and magic.”
Anamika’s work is complete with a QR code on the bottom left; when scanned with your mobile phone using an app, it takes you to a site that describes the work.
“Time and space are connected,” says Anamika thoughtfully. Consciously done or not, the circles on the wall suddenly remind me of wall clocks in different time zones, all ticking, synchronously holding pieces of the past in bells, vessels, and all things Madras. In public space, art engages private moments of contemplation.
