Pissing the point

Blood, perspiration, urine, tears. Another artist uses his bodily fluids. I can imagine the shock value, but they call it message. Or, Message.

The artist is not well-known, but even known names do indulge in gimmickry. Prashant Pandey wept and used exactly 20 tears for some works. Were they real tears of sorrow, of pain, of memory? Or did he slice onions? Then he collected 350 litres of urine, which must have been a bit at a time of course. Cigarette butts, expired chocolate are all there. He says:

“While these objects may be of no use to others, my work is about transforming them into social symbols and destablise opinions.”

Pakistani artist Tatheer Daryani who was in an arts college in India did pretty much the same thing. I had written earlier that I am all for such ‘subjective’ use in art and literature or any creative endeavour. I wonder, though, whether the avowed purpose truly manages to convey what it sets out to do. Blood and hair are universal, but would red paint and artificial hair not convey the same emotions. Had we not been informed would we even know?

Will the attention now not be on the artist’s blood and hair rather than the message she wishes to put forth? If it were about a personal journey, one can well understand. This is not to rebut such attempts but to question aloud about how much reaches how far. It applies to all of us who endeavour to do so.

The same would apply to Pandey’s works. Is the stench a reminder to us? Don’t we all live with our own smells and those of our surroundings? In a country like India what exactly is the purpose of such a wake-up call when we screw up our noses at the poor and homeless who have no choice to camouflage those smells since they have to urinate and defecate in the open?

Does anyone care to recycle their waste? There is plenty of it out there.

He has used a headless baby with expired chocolate to convey loss of innocence:

“Each chocolate square is a memory; it will keep melting and exposing the iron structure underneath.”

Chocolates can express memories, and expired chocolates are just those who have overstayed. What has the iron structure beneath got to do with it? I suppose it props up the sculpture in the gallery. You won’t hear this as a reason, though.

He has views on 9/11:

“It is sugarcane stalk that has been sucked off all its juices; this is how the victims and survivors of World Trade Centre attacks must have felt,”

What has been sucked off? It was an attack and human beings died. The survivors mourned the deaths. It isn’t that they stopped leading their lives. It is also pertinent to note that he comes from Gujarat where in 2002 the state government’s pogrom against its own citizens resulted in over 1000 murders (unofficial figures mention almost 2000) and large-scale displacement, and the culprits are still not arrested. He has no memorial sculpture for this.

I guess it would not be as internationally appealing. And a sheer waste?