What do you see?

What comes to our mind when we think of art? Maybe MonaLisa hanging in Louvre, or maybe the billion-dollar painting by Picasso or back home say by Hussain hanging in a rich man’s house, maybe the Taj Mahal or the temple art in Khajurao or churches in Italy, the Sistine Chapel the list could go on. Art means different things to different people. However, the one thing that is common in all art form is how it engages with the audience, the viewer. 

The Jan-Path- Janpath Station

Art is a means of self-expression. While there is no denying that the artist speaks to the world through the medium, however, when art is on a smaller scale for private viewing, it is largely artists narrative which has been appreciated and bought by an individual or a museum or a collective. Artist when painting mostly doesn’t think who is going to buy this work. Public art on the other hand is also about who is going to absorb or consume this work. That to my mind is also the biggest differentiator between Public Art and Art which hangs in private homes and museums.

From 2010 till now I got an opportunity to create art for the various stations of the Delhi Metro. (https://www.shubhrachaturvedi.com/installations-murals

You Are Here-Central Secretariat Station

). Along with fellow artist (Vibhor Taneja and Vishwesh Sant), I have conceptualised, designed and executed artworks for 5 metro stations so far. The experience of making art for an urban space, at that scale, with different materials for varied target groups was not only challenging but an eye-opener. Before the first project, I had never gone out of my studio and done anything of this nature.

Khwabon ka Karvan- Jamia Milia Islamia

The artwork in a public space like a metro station is viewed by varied kinds of people, a tourist, a worker, a vendor, a businessman and a student of an elite college alike. The visual language has to be powerful and yet simple so that all can understand it. That is the beauty of public art, it brings out art from elite spaces to the masses. Everyone can enjoy, reflect and try and make sense of it. It is also an opportunity for the artist to say that which could go out to a larger section of society. So in one of our works “You are Here” at the Central Secretariat Metro Station we thank the Delhi Metro for making our lives so easy like time travel one enters the tunnel in New Delhi and within minutes comes out in the Old Delhi, the Delhi where our heritage still thrives in the mosques and the forts and the bazaars. In another work at the Janpath Station, we have brought out how the common man and along with the monuments in the vicinity of the station all come together to give the city its characters. Recognizable forms, big scale and colour all make the viewer stop and see the work. Taking a selfie in front of the work is a new thing. At the work in Indira Gandhi Domestic Airport Metro Station, we gave the audience a tour of Delhi. If anyone comes to Delhi for the first time, what is it that they will find here? Calling it “Delhi Hues”, this was also our chance to make people stop in their everyday rush and see and recognise what a great and rich city they live in. To engage with the academic community, our work at the Jamia Milia Islamia Metro Station, “Khwabon ka Karvan”, gives tribute to the education system and how dreams get nurtured in an academic place and that the dreams do come full circle. The artwork is lively and colourful as should be in a place like a university metro station. Fortunately our client, the Delhi Metro, never interfered in the creative process, once they approved the idea.  

However, in public art, the concept at drawing board and working at the site can be far from each other and this we learnt the hard way. Working at the site with workers can be a different experience and full of happy anecdotes for later on. In our first project, one day, at about 1.30 am the toughened glass that was to be fitted on the artwork shattered, leaving us all shocked, hassled and delaying our work. In another station, the room at the station where our fabricated work panels were kept got locked. The key broke in the lock. These were some sophisticated locks from a Japanese company and it took almost 10 days for the door to be replaced and the room and panels to be accessible. We came up with happy phrases for the occasion, our favourite being the dialogue from the TV series CID, “Daya, darwaza tod do”

Delhi Hues- Indira Gandhi Domestic Airport

  (Daya break the door). At another time, once at a site, we took a foldable chair with us to sit. While we were gone for tea, our chair vanished and just to be found with the security guard who insisted that it was metro property and therefore his and that he won’t give it to us. In our last project at Jamia station, we went wrong in the calculation and the metal cutouts that reached the site were 4 times than the actual sizes. We realized our mistake only when the cut-outs reached the station and you can imagine what must have happened to us, post that. Most stations we worked on are underground and are only lit artificially. In our enthusiasm, the first set of works we created were backlit, side-lit and we created drama with light to ensure that it catches the viewer attention. It did catch attention for sure but with time the lights went out and were not replaced or sometimes the people forgot to switch on the lights and without light, the artwork hardly appealed. We learnt our lesson for future projects, which is to provide as much as you can with ambient lights and zero maintenance.  

The Heritage Saga- Jama Masjid

An idea in the head goes through a journey of paper, computer, workshop, CNC machines, hammers and drills and paints and sprays and screws and bolts and then after several months takes birth. When we sit down to ideate, think and visualise what we want to see out there and then when at the time of installation we see our little forms grow big and get up on the wall the feeling is akin to a parent seeing a child graduate. Believe me, there is nothing more satisfying for an artist.

It feels even better when in front of your work, strangers stop and take a picture and then post it on social media or when you meet someone you don’t know and they say yes we have seen your work at the such and such station. That feeling is overwhelming and the moment is priceless.

This October, we complete 10 years since our first public artwork got completed and when we got complimented by none other than Mr E Sreedharan. This post is to commemorate the journey since then. 

© Shubhra
#14 October 22, 2020

#MyThursdayThing will be published every other Thursday, on my blog https://shubhrathoughts.blogspot.com/ and shared on my social media handles.

Excerpts from the above post were written for an online exhibition currently on in Paris https://www.urbansemiotics.online

https://www.urbansemiotics.online/post/shubhra-chaturvedi-on-urban-semiotics