Meet the men behind Kochi-Muziris Biennale 2016

LR KochiMuziris Biennale KMB cofounders Bose Krishnamachari and Riyas Komu and curator for KMB 2016 Sudarshan Shetty at his Chembur studio PicSameer MarkandeOf all the quarters that artist Sudarshan Shetty thought he would receive curatorial advice from an autorickshaw wallah was the last person he expected As curator for the third and upcoming edition of KochiMuziris Biennale KMB Shetty has made monthly trips to the port town this year where he befriended an autorickshaw wallahHe said he was thorough with past editions of the Biennale and let me know that if I needed any suggestions for South American artists he would be the man to go to recalls Shetty adding This kind of engagement at a biennale is rarely seen elsewhere in the world People come in busloads to be a part of the KMB they read wall texts and watch long video works patientlyAt his studio mdash a maisonette in Chembur with sculptures stacked in corners mdash Shetty is seated on a black highback club chair with the rain pattering furiously on the windowpane behind us On a red couch beside him are Bose Krishnamachari and Riyas Komu cofounders of the KMB This is a rare moment mdash when all three can be found in one room in Mumbai mdash a breather from the projects they are part of in India and abroadAfter an intense year of presenting the upcoming edition to various patrons Shetty released the curatorial note and the full list of 89 participating artists and counting last week with the mission to keep one of Asias major art festivals as the peoples biennale During the Biennale some cafeacutes in Kochi have Biennale fish on their menu Artist Mithu Sen once shared a video where the nariyal wallah was selling biennale paani adds Krishnamachari whom Shetty teasingly calls Bose the BossA still from Inverso Mundus an HD video installation by Russian art collective AESF The group will participate in the upcoming edition of the KochiMuziris Biennale PicsKochi Biennale FoundationBack to the futureOnce Shetty orders masala dosas and idlis for everyone not because he has a penchant for Udupi hotels but because these are the only safe things to eat he narrates how the theme for KMB 2016 mdash forming in the pupil of an eye mdash came about It is a verse gleaned from the poetry of Sharmistha Mohanty also a participating artist I wanted to play with the idea of continuity about looking at the past and the future inward and outward he saysCompare this with KMBs earlier themes mdash Kochi as the centre of cosmopolitanism in 2012 and Kochi as the legendary maritime gateway in 2014 mdash and Shettys theme sounds less specific The concept note sounds a bit cryptic and is deliberately openended I wanted to open up ways of having conversations with people who are seemingly outside of the expectations of the contemporary art space he explains adding that Kochi mdash a city with more than 30 nonMarathi speaking communities have lived over the centuries mdash continues to be a muse Its diversity which inspired KMB 2012 and 2014 is still at the heart of Shettys curatorshipA 100metrelong installation made out of 9000 childrens backpacks by Chinese artist Ai Weiwei in Munich in 2009 It appeared in So Sorry his video work shown in the first edition of KMB Weiwei was recently banned by the Chinese government from the Yinchuan Biennale curated by KrishnamachariFor the 55yearold artist who has exhibited at Londons Tate Modern this is his first role as curator He was chosen by a 10member advisory committee which included artist Atul Dodiya and art patron Kiran Nadar KMBs cofounders who were also part of the committee had among their suggestions that it should be an artist who curates the Biennale rather than a critic or curatorIndian art needs to go through a transformation which has to be deliberate this can emanate from the artist as creator artist as curator and artist as a partner with other artists he says hoping that there will be an end to looking at Kerala mdash and by extension Indian art mdash through Eurocentric models and postEnlightenment thought Lets hark further back to the preEnlightenment days he suggests bringing up academician Dr Dilip M Menons essay on artist Kesari Balakrishnan Pillai and the invention of Europe for modern Kerala Is Rome a chapter in the history of Kerala or is Kerala a chapter in the history of RomeShetty has been mulling over these concerns for the last year and longer as an artist To be able to look back in order to be able to perform for the future mdash within this space the contemporary and the traditional are at loggerheads The Biennale plays with these questions constantly What if we were able to present them without the opposition says ShettyWhich is why this time when KMB 2016 opens on December 12 contemporary dancer Padmini Chettur will present a modern rendition of varna and Anamika Haksar will present a theatrical production specially adapted for KMB 2016 with Marathi poet and Dalit activist Namdeo Dhasals poetry On a wall opposite Haksars piece there will be muralist PK Sadanandans work on a narrative drawn from KeralaThere will also be a series of works by photographer Mansi Bhatt on prosthetics When we ask if these will be at Aspinwall House mdash a seafacing heritage property that functions as the primary venue of KMB mdash Shetty shrugs and replies I dont want Aspinwall House to become the centre of everythingIn an attempt to assimilate the city as wholesomely as possible Argentinean writer Sergio Chejfec will spread his text as a graffitinovel across the walls of Kochi It will be like a treasure hunt so that by the time you finish reading his work you would have covered a major part of the city explains ShettyThe critics will weigh in and point out that this years KMB features more than a desirable share of performances We also want to know whats the space for contemporary performance artworks in KMB 2016 Shetty blurs the line I dont want to make a distinction like that mdash between performances and performance works There are a number of traditional practices in India that are eminently contemporary How can you bring a classical musician like a Rajasthani folk musician into the Biennale It cant happen except through performances he saysMothering BiennalesKrishnamachari believes that several other biennales have been inspired by the KochiMuziris version We have become something of a case study for it is not easy to bring in local participation says Krishnamachari Making biennale a household term he cites the example of a local school in Pattathanam Kollam Kerala where a students biennale was conducted during the vacationsBose also curated the maiden edition of the Yinchuan Biennale in China which opened on September 9 Two weeks before the Yinchuan Biennale opened Chinese contemporary artist Ai Weiwei was dropped from the list under the orders of the Chinese governmentIronically Ai Weiwei was the first artist to be signed up by Krishnamachari and Komu when Kochi Biennale debuted in 2012 That time too the Chinese government barred Weiwei from appearing in Kochi but the show went on with two of his video works In Kerala with its history of social action an argument for censorship cannot sustain It has been about the upliftment of people a movement from bottom to top says Komu