Contemporary artists, painters, sculptors, sound designers and performing artistes will come together and create diverse forms of art as part of the Appa Art Fest that’s being held at Kamshet from Thursday till March 13.
Curated and conceptualised by graphic designer Karthikeyan Ramachandran, the festival is a tribute to his father, artist K.N. Ramachandran.
“While last year, there were 50 artists who created diverse works such as paintings, sculptures, sound design, light design and visual arts etc, this time, there are 70 artists. We decided to tie-up with another country to facilitate an exchange of artistes between both the nations. This year, since we were celebrating the 70th year of Independence, we wanted to have a British-India connect. We will explore the timeline from 1947 to 2017, with each artist choosing a particular year, interpreting it in their own way and create a piece of art based on it,” says Ramachandran. All artworks produced at the festival will be shown on the final day.
Ramachandran adds that all the art works are unique and will compel people to see important historical events in a new light. For instance, artist Kunal Naik, who has chosen the year 1974, has correlated Gautam Buddha with the Pokhran nuclear blasts as the first nuclear test, codenamed Smiling Buddha, was conducted in May that year.
Ramachandran says, “We didn’t know there was a connect between these two events. But the [operation was codenamed] Smiling Buddha. That’s how even the CIA didn’t know about this operation and it was the most covert operation done by the Indian government. Every time it was a success, people associated with the operation would present a sculpture of Buddha to the President. That correlation is beautiful.”
Ad film director, digital artist, and psychedelic painter Marlon Rodrigues is doing a psychedelic visual design connecting multi-layered images set in 1976 when Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page and Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger gave a new meaning to the term flower power in the Flower Power Story .
Ramachandran says, “Actor and art director Teddy Maurya has chosen 1966 when man landed on the moon. The 9 in it has a loose screw, so the digit keeps flopping and the year becomes 1666, when Newton discovered the law of gravity. So he has juxtaposed both the years and shown the law of anti-gravity and what lies in between in, The logic of gravity .”
Sound designers and soundscape artistes will perform by the hour and create a five-minute piece each of which will be part of the year that they chosen. With a total of seven exhibitions, seven creative workshops and 25 performances, works by contemporary artistes including Bandish Projeckt, Vivek Rajgopalan, Swadesi, True Amy, Global Face & Logic (People’s Army), Arun Kulkarni, Ganesh Doddamani, Bobby Friction and Bhavishyavani will be displayed.
Celebrity hair stylist Sapna Bhavnani will put up a photo exhibition, inspired by nature and based on the Nirbhaya rape case in 2012. ‘City by Colour’ by phoptographer Mayur Tekchandani is a photographic documentation of Mumbai where the various hues of the metropolis have been depicted in a pantone shade card.
Apart from this, there will also be poetry workshops and amphitheatre performances. “Our goal is to create a presentation of what all the artistes have created including audio, video pieces, paintings and sculptures and provide multiple meanings to people,” says Ramachandran.
Appa Art Fest 2017 will be held from today to March 13, at Kamshet.
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