Will immersive shows take art to another dimension in a country where museums are ancient relics themselves?

Bengaluru, Apr 14 (PTI) If you are seeing ‘The Starry Night’ pop up in your Insta reels of late, it’s probably because social media influencers in India are discovering the instant appeal of immersive art.

A trend that had the western world, particularly Europe, in its grip for over a decade has finally arrived in India. And who better than the one considered the “rockstar of art world,” Van Gogh, to prop up the debut of immersive art in India.

But will it take art to another dimension, as it is being claimed, in a country where museums are ancient relics themselves? The jury is still out, as Van Gogh 360 has just started its journey here.

The show was wrapped up in Mumbai and has moved to Delhi (on till April 30). The organiser in India, Bookmyshow.com, claims great response so far, but is yet to find venues for Pune, Bengaluru or Hyderabad — planned pitstops for the show next.

“Setting up such a show requires a lot in terms of space and infrastructure. So, it takes time. Depending on what works out, we will move the show to any of these three cities next,” said a member of the organising team, not wanting to be named.

Immersive art, usually paintings of uber-famous artists reproduced through digital projections and theatrical-style sets, sometimes even through virtual reality prism, lets one walk into a painting and experience the colours, textures and brush strokes in a more intimate way.

Perhaps, considering the cost involved in staging such a show, to gauge the response first, Bookmyshow.com already allows pre-registrations in Pune, Bengaluru and Hyderabad.

Ravikumar Kashi, a contemporary artist who has developed a unique artistic language for himself that draws from his printmaking and papermaking training, is not surprised that India should host immersive art experiences. “Indians are travelling a lot these days, particularly many youngsters are going abroad to study. A lot of people are exposed to the western museum culture and, at the end of the day, these shows go where they sell.”

But Kashi pointed out that they cannot be expected to change the attitude towards art overnight.

According to him, making money is the main motive for such interventions rather than serving art. “If you look at the bigger picture, only a few names are kept alive — like Van Gogh and Picasso — one way or the other. It’s a huge money-making industry. Much has happened after them, but something else is happening around these artists and it is not necessarily because of their talent. It is the narratives spun around them, which can be conveniently tweaked every now and then to suit the time,” added Kashi.

In a disparaging article for The New York Times about the trend, art critic Jason Farago too calls it an artistic brand activation. “What a few entrepreneurial exhibitionists figured out is that many of us are less attached to Van Gogh’s paintings than to the mythology that surrounds them. And that you can exhibit for cheap,” he writes.

Suresh Jayaram, who runs an alternative art space in Bengaluru called 1ShanthiRoad to encourage newer voices in contemporary art, feels every art has to be immersive and trigger one’s senses. “Art is like a temple or a mosque an immersive experience by itself. You can use whatever technology you want, label it any way or even package certain kinds of art, but if it fails to engage people in the first place, it does not matter how you project it later, it will fail.”

For Jayaram, art should convey the socio-political issues of its time and make people think and question. “The rest is entertainment, which is fine too, so long as we know it is what it is.”

Delhi-based visual artist Babu Eshwar Prasad, who although trained in painting and printmaking, switched to moving images to express his creativity, feels technology is a boon to artists.

“I haven’t seen any immersive art show, but I have watched a few virtual reality films. I guess immersive art shows are something similar to that. They are a completely different space. Although such technology is not accessible to every artist at the moment, who knows what can happen tomorrow. When I started, all I had was printmaking and painting. But today I am more of an arthouse movie maker and it was possible only because of technology.”

Although critical of how such technology is being used at the moment to push convenient artists Kashi too feels the concept could very well be the answer at a time when the government is pulling back from investing in art. “It certainly pulls people, makes money which is much more than we can say for existing museums. I teach art appreciation part-time at RV College of Architecture. In every batch, I get maybe five to six who have been to a museum. We are talking about creatively oriented students here,” added Kashi.