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Journalism of Courage
Sculptor Ved Gupta8217;s little men wear wicked smiles and have sparkling eyes. Look again, and in the contours of their caricatured figures, you will find biting satire. After receiving accolades at the Asia Pacific Contemporary Art Fair in Shanghai, Gupta has brought his fibreglass figurines before Delhi8217;s complacent art public. 8220;Arrested Moment8221; is also Gupta8217;s first solo show in the Capital.
8220;The so-called bada aadmi is not a man of enormous size. He is the one with power, though, one that is attained at the cost of the ordinary, lower-class citizen,8221; says Gupta, 32. He would know 8212; his own life has been an extraordinary journey of a labourer becoming one of India8217;s brightest talents. When he came to Delhi 13 years ago, it was not as an artist. He had arrived from Bihar with a shirt on his back and a rupee to his name.
There are bronze figurines, too, with distorted faces, accentuated by scaffolds, a reminder of his days as a labourer. 8220;My visual language is meant to attack class structures,8221; he says. Take a look, he says. And you8217;ll keep looking.
The show at the Visual Arts Gallery, India Habitat Centre, is on till September 30 and then moves to Gallery Threshold, F-213 A, Lado Sarai.
