Happy New Year!
By the time you have this issue of Art and Deal in your hand, Delhi will have a new government led by the Aam Aadmi Party leader, Arvind Keijriwal. A ‘Broom stick’ is the symbol of this new political outfit and Arvind Keijriwal (46), a former bureaucrat, with his visionary and missionary fervor, has assured that he would clean up the socio-political scenario of Delhi state using ethical governance as his motto. Team Art and Deal wishes him all the best. What surprises me is the total silence of Aam Aadmi Party on the issues of culture. Perhaps, culture is an outcome of all socio-political activities of the individuals and their collective, the society. If the socio-political scenario is clean then the culture should also be naturally clean and shining. We had these fabulous slogans like ‘India Shining’ and ‘Incredible India’, which in the long run became a mockery of themselves. In politics, symbolism is an unavoidable inevitability. Symbolism is what people understand best. Aam Aadmi Party and its leader Arvind Keijriwal too have introduced a new set of symbolism in their deliberately chosen Spartan dress codes and the conspicuous ‘topi’ with ‘aam aadmi party’ and ‘mein aam aadmi hun’ (I am an ordinary man) inscribed in Hindi on either side of it. It has added to the inventory of visual culture in India. Aam Aadmi Party, like Mahatma Gandhi, revels in performative symbolism. The leaders have taken a vow to end the VIP culture by shunning the red beacon in their official vehicles, denying personal security cover, official bungalows and travelling by metro rail. These social performances are meant to gain and increase the confidence of the common people who live in fear, without security cover, red beacons and safe living conditions. Perhaps, this performativity of Aam Aadmi Party is
the new socio-political culture and it would eventually contribute to the creation of a distinct visual culture in our country at par with the performance art practices that we have today. This month, we also have the inauguration of the 6th edition of the now international India Art Fair. Despite having a few other fairs across the country, IAF still holds its prestige and reputation as a unique and quality-based International art fair in India that attracts a majority of art lovers to Delhi in the month of January. Abysmal market performance during the past few years has not dulled the enthusiasm of the galleries though, the number of participating foreign galleries has gone down slightly in this edition of the IAF. Neha Kirpal, the Director of IAF is optimistic and to a certain extent, confident about the return of a strong art market in India.

JOHNY ML