HT Chandigarh Our Take: Art versus administration in the tricity

Listen! There never was an artistic period. There never was an art-loving nation ... James Whistler, an influential American artist based in the UK, shocked London town by making this statement way back in 1885.

Over 200 years later one remembered Whistler when UT adviser Manoj Parida recently said, “Government money cannot be left to private hands. Culture department manages these academies as the nodal department. It ensures that rivalry among artists is contained and political selections are curtailed.”

Parida was speaking to the Hindustan Times on the unceremonious ouster of some of the Akademi chairpersons and handing over of the interim charge of the Akademis to secretary cultural affairs Vinod P Kavle instead of the vice-chairman.

While Chandigarh has always been infamous for its babudom with even Nek Chand, creator of the world famous Rock Garden, being forced to toe the administration’s line, Kavle’s new role evoked sharp reactions on social media. “ This is truly disturbing and bureaucratic meanness at its height. Bureaucracy is trained to be small minded, suspicious and mean,” said veteran theatre director Neelam Mansingh.

Senior painter Balwinder took a dig at the Chandigarh Lalit Kala Academy being spared by the administration since wives of senior bureaucrats were allowed to share exhibition spaces with established artists. “We the local artists perhaps deserve all this.By remaining mute spectators and playing minions to babus we have been treated thus. Otherwise, how could bureaucrats have continued heading the city museum for decades? Not just the museum, even the College of Art has not had a professional artist as principal, which has proved to be very discouraging for students who come to study art.”

Things are looking gloomy for the entire tricity, which boasts of the cultural academies of Punjab and Haryana and the Central body of the North Zone Cultural Centre. For many years the Haryana state akademies lay dormant after the change of government.

Another problem is that the same set of names keep cropping up at one academy or another as office-bearers. Can this order be changed?

Control code

Should bureaucrats manage the tricity art scene?

Will bureaucratic control of the akademis and Art College negatively impact the tricity art scene? Send your responses to chandigarh@hindustantimes.com by November 6.