Venkatappa Art Gallery

12°58′27″N77°35′43″E/ 12.9742357°N 77.5953023°E/12.9742357; 77.5953023

Venkatappa Art Gallery(VAG) is situated inBangalore,India,in the vicinity ofCubbon Parkand next to theBangalore Museumas well as theVisvesvaraya Industrial and Technological Museum.It attracts artists and art lovers from all overKarnataka.^{[citation needed]}

History

TheGovernment of Mysorehad decided in 1966 that a gallery/museum was needed that could hold the paintings, musical instruments andplaster of parisbas reliefs which formed the collection of Karnataka's most famous artist,K. Venkatappa(1886–1965), a pupil ofAbanindranath Tagore.^[1]

Venkatappa Art Gallery came into being with the foundation stone being laid by the then Chief MinisterS.Nijalingappaon 24 November 1967. It took a long time to complete. Artists who were frustrated with the delays went on an innovative protest on the footpath in front of Bible Society demanding the gallery space be finished in 1971. Artists included G.S Shenoy, Bhaskar Rao, Ramesh Rao, Acharya and Punam Chattaya. The building was finally completed in 1975.^[2]

It was intended to function both as amuseumholding the works of K. Venkatappa as well as becoming a space for artists from all over Karnataka to use for their arts practice. VAG is commonly mistaken for the Bangalore Museum as they both stand next to each other and yet they are very different. VAG continues to be a space that accesses the contemporary holdings within it a museum as well as agallery,something quite rare in the history of the structure of museums.

Themodernist buildingwas built by theKarnataka Public Works Departmentin the lines of an artificial island with a beautiful moat with a lotus pond surrounding it. This was used recently as the scene for a painting protest undertaken by VAG Forum in memory of K.Venkatappa protesting the hand over of Karnataka's cultural commons to private parties.^[3]

The plan for the museum/gallery was for five floors but only three floors have been built and the whole building has been air-conditioned.

It also houses the collections of KK Hebbar and the sculptor Rajaram.KK Hebbar,an internationally acclaimed painter from Karnataka, donated his collection to Venkatappa Art Gallery in 1993. The Government of Karnataka also bought some of his works.^[4]

The KK Hebbar Gallery wing was set up in 1993–94 with the help of Chiranjiv Singh who was the former Indian ambassador toUNESCOand artistSG Vasudevwho coordinated the donation.^{[citation needed]}They were helped by art historian Marishamachar. The gallery space was renovated in 2004-5 by Rekha Rao, artist and daughter of KK Hebbar, at a cost of 16 lakhs. They changed the flooring and installed a new lighting system.

Contemporary art

Contemporary artistslikePushpamala N,Sheela Gowdastarted off their careers with solo shows at VAG.^{[citation needed]}The gallery has hosted umpteen number of group shows by students and practising artists. Eight Kala Melas, organised byLalit Kala Academy,beginning in 1980 and through the next three decades have had great outreach and participation here at the gallery. VAG has also been the place which hosted the International live Art Festival, CoLab,India Foundation for the ArtsPublic art presentations and the Ananya Drishya talks by artists which have been open and free for the public.

Venkatappa Art Gallery also played host to the seventhKhojInternational Artists’ Residency inBangalorein December 2003.^{[citation needed]}This brought together artists from both Bangalore and the rest of the world to enable a working together, opening up the space for new conversations, for new dialogues, new partnerships to form. This also was another important step in bringing together artists and art practitioners from the north and south of India into a collective arts conversation.

‘Silence of Furies and Sorrows – Pages of a Burning City’, was a group show with C.F. John, Raghavendra Rao, Nandakishore, Ravisankar Rao, Amrish, Shantamani, Tripura Kashyap, and Ramesh Chandra exhibited in the Venkatappa Art Gallery.^{[citation needed]}This show came about as response to what was a troubling series of communal riots that rocked Bangalore in 1994.

Controversy

The tourism department identified Venkatappa Art Gallery as one of the tourist sites up for ‘adoption’ around 2014–15.^[5]AnMoUwas signed in July 2015 between the departments of museums and archaeology and tourism and theTasveer Foundation,^[6]which will see the complete transfer of management, curation, renovation to the private foundation. This was done without involving the larger community of artists who stake a claim to VAG as a space that has nurtured them and continues to be a space where younger artists can experiment with their practice.^{[citation needed]}The controversy is further fuelled by the fact that the director of the Tasveer Foundation,Abhishek Poddar,was also a member of the Karnataka Tourism Vision Group,^[7]which recommended and set in place the process for ‘adoption’.^[8]

References

^Government of Karnataka, Department of Archaeology, Museums and Heritage."Museums in Karnataka".Department of Archaeology, Museums and Heritage.Department of Archaeology, Museums and Heritage. Archived fromthe originalon 18 October 2015.Retrieved16 April2016.{{cite web}}:CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^Staff Reporter (1 April 2016)."The footpath was his gallery".No. Bangalore. The Hindu.Retrieved16 April2016.
^Chronicle, Deccan."From paint brushes to black umbrellas".Deccan Chronicle.Retrieved10 April2016.^{[dead link]}
^Bharadwaj, K.V. Aditya (4 April 2016)."K.K. Hebbar's family wants a trust to manage Venkatappa gallery".No. Bangalore. The Hindu.Retrieved16 April2016.
^M Sripad, Ashwini (24 January 2016)."Private Companies Chip in With Makeover Plans".The New Indian Express.No. Bangalore. The New Indian Express. Archived fromthe originalon 24 January 2016.Retrieved20 April2016.
^Narayanan, Nayantara (28 March 2016)."Artists are fighting to keep the Karnataka's only public art gallery public".Scrol.in.Scroll.in.Retrieved20 April2016.
^Karnataka, Government of."Tourism Vision Group".Government of Karnataka.Government of Karnataka.Retrieved20 April2016.
^Rao, Alka."Venkatappa Art Gallery Issue".VAG Forum.VAG Forum.Retrieved16 April2016.

External links

[1] Government of Karnataka, Department of Archaeology, Museums and Heritage."Museums in Karnataka".Department of Archaeology, Museums and Heritage.Department of Archaeology, Museums and Heritage. Archived fromthe originalon 18 October 2015.Retrieved16 April2016.{{cite web}}:CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

[2] Staff Reporter (1 April 2016)."The footpath was his gallery".No. Bangalore. The Hindu.Retrieved16 April2016.

[3] Chronicle, Deccan."From paint brushes to black umbrellas".Deccan Chronicle.Retrieved10 April2016.^{[dead link]}

[4] Bharadwaj, K.V. Aditya (4 April 2016)."K.K. Hebbar's family wants a trust to manage Venkatappa gallery".No. Bangalore. The Hindu.Retrieved16 April2016.

[5] M Sripad, Ashwini (24 January 2016)."Private Companies Chip in With Makeover Plans".The New Indian Express.No. Bangalore. The New Indian Express. Archived fromthe originalon 24 January 2016.Retrieved20 April2016.

[6] Narayanan, Nayantara (28 March 2016)."Artists are fighting to keep the Karnataka's only public art gallery public".Scrol.in.Scroll.in.Retrieved20 April2016.

[7] Karnataka, Government of."Tourism Vision Group".Government of Karnataka.Government of Karnataka.Retrieved20 April2016.

[8] Rao, Alka."Venkatappa Art Gallery Issue".VAG Forum.VAG Forum.Retrieved16 April2016.

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