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Displaying the moon’s many moods at Venice

Sunil Gawde is all set to show his work at the Oscar’s equivalent in the art world.

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At 2.30 in the afternoon the sun wreaks havoc and the shirt is plastered to the body like a Superman costume. A long trudge along the colonial architecture of south Mumbai finally ends at a sanctuary: the studio of artist Sunil Gawde. On the third floor of an old, beautiful structure with an ornate facade, the aesthetically modern interiors of Gawde’s workplace offers a formidable resistance to the hostile atmosphere outside.

It is in this oasis of calm and perennially temperate climate that the artist is executing his latest work — a giant installation titled ‘Alliteration’, featuring many moons and their moods through a constant motion of waxing and waning. This work will be shown at the 53rd Venice Biennial this year in an exhibition called Making Worlds.

Artists, art collectors and connoisseurs the world over refer to this biennial — held at Venice — as the Oscar equivalent in the art world. The five-month-long affair, which opens for the public on June 7, has been a meeting ground of avant-garde art ever since its inception 106 years ago.

Gawde wasn’t prepared for the invitation. “I didn’t even dare to dream about participating in such a grand show, fearing it was too big an aspiration for me,” he said between sips of a cold drink, trying to appear composed. The icing on the cake for him was the fact that the curator of his exhibition is the director of the biennial, Daniel Birnbaum.

Apart from Gawde, three other Indian artists - Sheela Gowda, Anju Dodia and Nikhil Chopra - have also been invited to Venice this year. The Indian participants in the previous exhibition in 2007 were Subodh Gupta, Nalini Malani, and Riyaz Komu.

Gawde’s labour of love is a rectangular 1.5 tonne mild steel structure, seven-and-a-half feet in height, 15 feet in width, and two-and-a-half feet in depth. It required five months of hard work from his team of assistants. “The constant changing of the phases of the moons on the front side are controlled by chains and pulleys installed at the rear side of the structure. It is difficult to make out from a distance that the facade is made up of two layers, one of which is static and the other mobile, giving an illusion of kinetic moons,” explained Gawde.

 “I have shown that time is one long, continuous flow, and it is only a human endeavour to break it down to seconds, minutes and hours, to days and nights, to weeks, months and years. In the infinite universe, such segments do not have any relevance or impact so it is impossible to control time.”

This Mumbai-based artist and a former student of the Sir JJ School of Art has exhibited his works, among other places, at the Beijing Art Fair, Gulf Art Fair in Dubai, and at St Tropez Beach in France.

It’s a five-month art affair

Artists, art collectors and connoisseurs the world over refer to this biennial - held at Venice - as the Oscar equivalent in the art world. The five-month-long affair, which opens for the public on June 7, has been a meeting ground of avant-garde art ever since its inception 106 years ago.

Apart from Gawde, three other Indian artists - Sheela Gowda, Anju Dodia and Nikhil Chopra - have also been invited to Venice this year.
The Indian participants in the previous exhibition in 2007 were Subodh Gupta, Nalini Malani, and Riyaz Komu.
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