Abishek had given me a list of Bombay galleries to check out. Staff at the hotel seemed clueless as to their location, even when provided with their addresses. However, at the first one I managed to find, I fortunately met one of the directors, Mort Chatterjee, who gave me directions to the other galleries, most of which turned out to be within a ten minute radius (on foot) from the hotel. For the benefit of others wanting to check out Bombay’s lively art scene, I have produced a gallery map, which should be available soon at all the serious Colaba galleries.
The Chatterjee and Lal gallery is a lovely loft style space, which was showing the slyly funny paintings of Piyali Ghosh, which mock the mannerisms and pretensions of the ruling class in vicious human-animal hybrid caricatures. I also enjoyed the work at The Guild, two series of contrasting work by Praja Papotnis, one of glistening viscera, the other of gridded systems derived from the facades of apartment blocks.
As I left Bombay, the 5 day festival of Ganpati was beginning. Everywhere in the city one met small processions following vividly painted plaster statues of the elephant-headed god Ganesh, accompanied by ear-splitting drumming. Temporary temples, lashed together out of bamboo and tarpaulin, accommodated larger statues and attracted a steady stream of devotees. In some districts these structures reach fantastic proportions, and actually become giant sculptures. Apparently, organised crime bosses use this as a way of marking territory and demonstrating their power. I saw a photograph in the newspaper of one in the shape of a cruise liner, about 200 feet long, funded (allegedly) by a £30,000 donation from a crime boss whose base of operations is a similar vessel, prowling the lawless waters off Malaysia.
