During the preview of Dare to Care, Osian’s fundraising art auction, SM Verghis realised that charity is not as simpleas we imagine
Giving, in the spirit of generosity sounds nice on the face of it. But can be a complicated process. Sometimes an open-hearted gesture can be misconstrued as condescending or done for the sake of showing off.
Other times it actually is the latter. Philosophically one wonders if both scenarios aren’t okay in the end because its the result that counts. A recent case in point is the preview show before April 19 auction organised by Osian’s for UNICEF. The subject is the adolescent girl.
Manu Parekh, one of a handful of artists to donate a recent work, Banaras in Monsoon (oil on canvas, 2013) said, and correctly it turned out, “how many people are actually willing to contribute a special piece just for an auctionIJ” Offering the answer, “not many I’m afraid.” Apart from V Ramesh’s Portrait of R, and a handful of others, most of the works are earlier ones, from private collections. And several were contributed by the artists themselves. Regardless of theme, works appear to have been chosen from what was randomly available.
So it was a haphazard show, and happened on a sultry day, within a suffocating room at The Kila. There were good bits and bad. Gems, as well as stuff that should have gone ignored entirely.
like two paintings by actress Deepti Naval, Feet of Glass and Draupadi which no offence to her, were probably given well-intended. But were hardly great cheese. She does have brand name attached however, which probably explained the going price of `4000,000 onwards.
And if the piece does collect, than you can drown the views of ‘critics’ such as ourselves in the kitchen sink! As we said, there was a lot of average stuff, though the names were big. The really would works were probably tough to give away. In those circumstances, if these fetch high prices, kudos to the artist brands.
Atul Dodiya’s The Wall (2007) has the signatures of cricketers inscribed on a wall, with a montage of a thoughtful Aamir Khan — it was shortly after lagaan. There is a quaint watercolour-pen work by MV Dhurandhar dating to 1921, film posters and stills — some fetching. like Zahira in a bathtub. We also saw Gopi Gajwani, MF Husain’s Mother Teresa, 1989 — when she was still in the good books. Along with Krishen Khanna and Chittoprasad. Plus two pen-ink works by Shiavax Chavda from a series on dancing, dating to 1956. Nothing was particularly rivetting, except for Dhruva Mistry’s Recline, 2004 — stainless steel with crimson epoxy paint.
Osian’s Chairman Neville Tuli explained this platform for philanthropy (50 per cent of proceeds go to UNICEF, 50 per cent to artists) wasn’t easy to create, because in his reckoning, people aren’t keen on charity. He blamed it on the low premium “on love,” world over. Maybe he has a point.
Osian’s will shortly join forces with publishing house MAPIN. Meanwhile, the actual auction will feature guests like Priyanka Chopra, who was once a girl child too!