Mohit Mishra takes a look at the street artists of Mumbai who never generally don’t get the opportunity to enter the gallery.
Mumbai has not only given birth to Bollywood and big theatre personalities, but it remains a hub of a spectrum of artists – dancers, musicians and painters. Great painters like M. F. Hussain, Tyeb Meta, S. H. Raza and F. N. Souza have all called this city home, where institutions like the J. J. School of Art have played a significant role in shaping their artistic styles.
Their legacies continue to be honoured in some of India’s finest galleries and museums, such as the iconic Jehangir Art Gallery, the first concrete structure in the gothic landscape of the Kala Ghoda area. While much has been written about renowned artists and established galleries, let us now turn our attention to the lesser-known talents who showcase their work outside, in the open air.
Outside the Jehangir Art Gallery, you find a series of ‘small-scale’ artworks and paintings being displayed on the pavements for sale. These didn’t have the opportunity to enter the gallery and find a place among the pricey artworks. They are often overlooked and even if someone looks at them they see them as ‘lowbrow’ and ‘non-serious art’ but simply decorative items.
However, many artists rely on them for their livelihood; some have spent their whole lives on the streets making them. They may not have that much recognition but their works are equally important collectively and even more if we see them under the great Indian Folk art tradition because, for them, it is not just a vocation but also slice of their lives. Here, on the street, artists come from every corner of Mumbai, carry their portable panels, chairs, colours, easels and canvases and start preparing right from dawn. After erecting panels on the sides, various artworks are hung on them and before the gallery opens, the pavement is filled with colourful pictures and faces. They make and sell paintings till dark and after that, they wrap everything up and go back to their beloved. Since they have been sitting here in the open air for a long time now and have endured the winds and rains together, they all have become a family to each other. Even the artists from the gallery come to visit them and appreciate their work. The whole day the atmosphere outside the gallery remains carnivalesque, people sitting, artists painting, children cheering, friends clicking pictures with the exhibits – it’s like a festival every day and more so during the Kala Ghoda Art Festival.
Whether there are landscapes, portraits, watercolours, caricatures, still life, charcoal sketches, tattoos, miniatures, rice-paintings, leafpaintings or even photographs, etc., each picture tells its own unique story. One such story is the story of Prasad Bhandari, who sketches live portraits and caricatures on the pavements. He, like many more, wants to display his artworks in the Gallery for once but due to the already long queue of artists desirous to display and the heavy prices that are needed to pay for its walls, he, like many more, is still waiting for his day. It’s not that he is not happy in his place, he says that sitting on the street and interacting with new faces and drawing them real-time under the sun in the lap of nature is more joyous than practicing art in a studio in isolation. When I asked about the wall that separates the displays in the gallery and the pavement showcase, he made a very pithy statement there is no difference in the art – there can’t be, the only thing is the importance of a space and the status or stigmas attached to it.
He beautifully says, “If I recite Gita or Ramayana on the streets, people won’t necessarily take me seriously and might consider me a beggar or a mad man but, on the other hand, if I sit in a temple and recite the same, people will listen and think of me as a pundit.” It is not about mere matter of space but of sensibilities. Earlier art had a lot to do with the skill of the artist and their aesthetic sensibilities and if something was not visually pleasing it was not considered art. Gradually it changed when the artistic expression and later the action of painting itself became the priority, but everything changed when art became a commodity. Now, sadly, the price of an artwork decides its value. The price tag increases if you put it on a big gallery wall and somehow our sensibilities say this is something great and worth investing in.
Unfortunately, humans give more importance to the platter than the pudding – but some folks can’t even afford to have the pudding, so what is left for them is to satiate on the leftovers. When the sun goes up, Jehangir’s shadow falls far on the street. It is under its shadow that street artists get a platform to express and earn. Not everyone can afford the paintings inside, so after they’ve explored the gallery exhibition they come on the street to take something as a keepsake. It is the only space where all types and classes of people gather and meet – it makes them all equal. It is where they have all kinds of serious discussions related to art, politics and life. But the sun goes up and down and the street always remains a second choice. When we talk about street art here in India, we generally think it cannot generate discussions or change narratives, whereas if we look outside, street art is a symbol of rebellion there. Many artists like Basquiat and Banksy came from and represent the streets. Our street artists too need the support and courage to see that their art is not simply a selling thing or a showpiece but has the potential to raise their voices.
