Vibrant and inimitable, Bangalore

When I returned from my first trip to New York, in 1977, I had said that Bangalore is a mini New York. What I meant was that Bangalore is open to all things new flowing into it and is very much like New York in that sense.

My assessment has proved correct. Over the years Bangalore has been recognised as a city that appreciates and supports not only different kinds of music, dance and theatre but also a wide range of art. Besides drawing, painting and sculpture, several visual artists of Bangalore are engaged in many innovative experiments with installations, site-specific work, video art, performance art, etc.

I see Bangalore becoming a very important centre for contemporary art in India in the future, with the participation and involvement of artists as well as the art-loving public. The newly established National Gallery of Modern Art — Bengaluru, the Venkatappa Art Gallery, the Karnataka Chitra Kala Parishath, a number of private art galleries, as well as institutions such as the Max Mueller Bhavan and Alliance Française, have been very active in promoting contemporary arts. The University of Bangalore has started a Department of Visual Arts, which is helping students not only from Bangalore but also from other parts of Karnataka to go in for higher education in art.

As my home town, Bangalore has been supportive of my work. I thrive in the midst of the literature, theatre, music and art that flourishes in the city. The city’s cosmopolitan culture offers us so much to learn and enjoy.

One reason for the vibrant art environment in the city is that it has been actively nurtured over the years. For example, in the late 1970s, the Karnataka Lalit Kala Academy (which comes under the Department of Culture, Government of Karnataka), then chaired by the late K K Hebbar, instituted a scholarship scheme for young artists. That helped young artists of that period in a significant way. Many of them were able to go and study in places like Baroda and Santiniketan, getting valuable exposure in the process.

They were very much influenced by such experiences. The Karnataka Kala Melas regularly organised by local artists from the 70s to the 90s not only enabled artists to work together and interact and exchange ideas, but also gave citizens opportunities to familiarise themselves with contemporary art and artists. As a result of such initiatives and experiences we have a number of talented youngsters enriching the culture of the city.

On the whole, it seems as if young people these days react mainly to Western music, besides Bollywood and other Indian pop music, even if they are conscious of the richness of Indian culture and traditions. There is nothing wrong with that. At the same time, I think it is important that they are provided with opportunities to get to know and appreciate this richness through proper exposure and good discussions on art and culture. This should be an important aspect of education. Some artists of Bangalore have launched an initiative — Ananya Drishya — to contribute to this process.

They conduct workshops for school children, as well as art appreciation lectures and workshops for others and are creating a digitised library of art which can be used for art education. Ananya Drishya’s parent body, “Ananya,” has been doing such work in the field of music for 15 years.

What upsets me most about Bangalore today is that we have not been able to maintain the glory of the city, its rich architecture. Beautiful and historic buildings — big and small — are being destroyed and in their place ugly constructions are coming up.

The way old buildings in cities like Paris and London are preserved and maintained while their interiors are modernised to suit present-day needs, show real respect for history and culture — architecture is very much a part of the culture of any place. I am not against development. I appreciate that modern architecture can be aesthetic too. But the majority of new buildings coming up in our cities, including Bangalore, have no aesthetic value at all and are not even in tune with the local climate.

We have also destroyed the magnificent trees for which this city was famous in the name of widening roads. Huge, ugly billboards have sprouted up everywhere. In the name of the Metro, we have destroyed the beautiful and historic Mahatma Gandhi Road (once called South Parade) and will soon destroy other lovely boulevards like the Rose Garden Road in Jayanagar.

We have indiscriminately allowed shopping malls to come up all over the place, including in areas that were once purely residential. We have watched as beautiful and essential open spaces like Lalbagh and Cubbon Park have been shrunk to accommodate roads and buildings.

We are tolerating ugly paintings on city walls, supposedly in an attempt to “beautify” Bangalore and glorify Karnataka. The city needs an urgent halt to further damage, and a good team of experts in different fields to give suggestions and make sure they are properly implemented. Bangalore is crying out for help.