A hotshot investment

Photography is gaining a strong presence in the contemporary art scene with   galleries showcasing many such works


Just a couple of years ago, photographs displayed in an art gallery in India would have raised the eyebrows of the highbrow, yet today they are viewed on par with paintings.

The impact of this medium on the contemporary art scene can be gauged from the fact that when the National Gallery of Modern Art, Mumbai, showcased the just-concluded month-long retrospective of photographer Raghu Rai’s oeuvre, they were forced to extend it by another month due to popular demand!

Early last year, the art world in Mumbai woke up to the fact that photography is a medium whose time has come. There was Raghu Rai’s Just by the Way: Rocks, Clouds and Nudes presented by Foss-Gandhi and Tasveer at the Jehangir Nicholson Gallery. Almost simultaneously, Jamaat Art Gallery celebrated their anniversary on January 8 with Subliminal, the debut show of art photography by fashion photographer Ashok Salian.

This year, other art galleries presented photography as an art form. The fine line between artists as photographers (Navjot at The Guild, Rameshwar Broota at Sakshi) and photographers as artists (Ketaki Sheth at Bodhi) is also indistinguishable.

“Photography has emerged as a strong presence in the contemporary art scene in India recently,” reiterates curator Ranjit Hoskote. “There is a very exciting inter-generational situation, with classic work by masters coexisting with exploratory work. Imagine a scenario in which photographers like Raghu Rai, Dayanita Singh, Ram Rahman, Pablo Bartholomew, Ketaki Sheth and Sunil Gupta show along with younger experimentalists.

Add to this the rich diversity of work being done by video artists working with still photography, such as Shilpa Gupta, and by artists using photography-based departures, such as Vivan Sundaram, Vidya Kamat and Rashid Rana.”

Since photographs are cost-effective as their prints can be multiplied, one can understand why it attracts collectors. But why are artists exploring this medium? Geetha Mehra of Sakshi throws light, “As technology changes, more devices become available as tools of expression. I enjoy the element of performance, where there is the intervention of the photographer at the time of taking the picture— a staged tableau if you like!”

Soon we could soon develop an audience big enough to sustain this exciting medium. As Hoskote says, “An art work will have an ascending value only if there are collectors, dealers, investors, speculators supporting its fortunes in the market. Photography has not yet arrived at the stage but it will probably get there in the next couple of years.” It’s going to be a breathtaking photo finish!