The Creative Process: The Arts of War (Spring 2017)

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Spring 2017 Balwan, Kausik. The Arts of War BALWAN BY KAUSIK MUKHOPADHYAY/ IMAGE: THE GUILD ART GALLERY Kausik grew up and went to art school at a time when the established status quo was anti-Dada, anti-Duchamp, and anti-Abstraction. The degeneracy and disdain that these art movements were regarded with fostered a pushback in the minds of artists like Kausik. Stifled by the expressly descriptive mode of representation, he recounts conversations with fellow artist Tushar Jog, he attempted to wrangle with the conceptual ideas that Duchamp bought out in his Readymades, questioning the role of the hand of the artist, of the role of the installation, and other fundamental questions on the nature of art. And it is with this in mind, that Kausik picks the two soldiers that waltz around the piece, directionless, and without any agency. The “badly-made GI Joe” toys, as Kausik describes them, remind 24
The Creative Process the viewer that children, too, are playing with Weapons of Mass Destruction, conspiring to make war, not love. However, Duchamp’s works still glossed over and idealised the struggles of life. Kausik’s Balwan is a pushback against the idealisation and fetishisation of violence and war. He tells TMAC, “The Mughal miniatures were violent as well. We were never really free of violence.” And in a way, Kausik is right. A lot of the underlying tension in representations of the Hindu epics and the painting tradition of the martial Rajputs indicate impending violence. For Kausik, this glorification of violence is abhorrent, and the attempt to represent war as glory is a blot on the conscience of the artist. Behind the creation of Balwan is a commentary on consumerism as it manifests itself in the art world. Kausik is fully aware of the traditions of the artists that came before him, and while mentioning Warhol, reminds one of the nature of the buyer. The art world is a market, where demand meets supply, and Kausik believes that “art is (now) a thing to satisfy your customer.” The reductivism that marks Kausik’s works is different, for it is meant to be homely, not to be consumerist. This is also why Kausik’s installations are not meant to last, and the materials are recycled into other installations. The ephemeral nature of Kausik’s art is a recognition of the commercialisation of art, for if art no longer exists, it cannot be sold. Ranjit Hoskote’s catalogue essay for an exhibition that marked Kausik’s return to the art world reads: Adopting a DIY aesthetic as he does, Mukhopadhyay turns his back on the kind of high finish that has been de rigueur in much postcolonial Indian art. However, the rough edges 25
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The Creative Process: The Arts of War (Spring 2017)

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