Wandering off the art fair in Delhi
Franck Barthelemy

There is something addictive about visiting art fairs. There is something exciting too. One can see in a couple of days hundreds of art works, many are mediocre, a few are good, and some are very good. The super VIP guests will have the privilege to spot the very good works first, and have a chance to buy one or several of them. There is another major advantage of being a VIP: the information. The VIP is usually informed about, often invited to, the off the mainstream art itineraries. This year, the India Art Fair’s VIP team did wonders (and believe you me, I am not into flattering). There were at least three events that were outstanding. The quality of the works, the concept and the curating are the reasons behind this paper.


A day before the fair opens, the Bombay artist Anju Dodiya invited us to her room, a big room though, the Bikaner House. I call it her room because as soon as I entered the exhibition, I felt a form of cosiness to the extent I thought I was entering into a very private opportunity to meet the artist. Not the artist in person, though she was there welcoming the guests, but the artist as an idea. The Air is a Mill of Hooks, the first few words of Mystic, a poem by Sylvia Plath, and Dodiya’s exhibition’s title, makes you dive into an ocean of dreams. The monumental size of the artworks makes you feel tiny, so tiny that you can easily believe you are back to your childhood when you used to live in a world made of adults. You need to look at the works from a distance, a distance that projects you into the works, into the world built by Dodiya for you. The material she had chosen reinforces the strength of the belief: fabric. She not only had used the fabric as a medium to support her drawings, stiches, etc. but also had mounted the works like giant pillows. You immediately feel like touching them, resting your head on them. You feel like closing your eyes and being part of the artist’s dream, the one she had delicately put on the pillow, like a personal gift note waiting for a reader. Then, back home, you rush to your computer to find out a bit more about the poem Dodiya had chosen to illustrate her body of works. You realize the poet takes you to a series of almost tangible memories, a smell, a taste, a church, a mystical encounter. The two artists seem to have started a long distance dialogue. One sends words to the other. The other sends images back. Both together theyhad weaved a dream where viewers (perhaps voyeurs) are welcome. An amazing emotional experience.