Kalaa Dhaaraa English Booklet

If you have two coins to spend; 

buy a loaf of bread with one,  and art with the other. 

For, bread is the means to live; and art is the reason.

                                    - an ancient Chinese saying

From the rock faces to the stretched canvases, art of painting is a steady stream of human emotions creatively finding expression through colours at all times of known history. Today, this creative human expression is as diverse as the persons wielding brushes. Every possible style, tradition, school and ‘ism’ exists today whether one likes it or not. Practitioners of one may look down upon others and vice-versa, but all of them exist in their own realities, thoughts and contexts. Even connoisseurs are drawn into the whirlpool of domination-game of artists. But one who stands outside this one-upmanship, only he/she can appreciate each form of art for its own merits and not in comparison with others.

All forms of art needs patronage. The role played by some of the great Wadiyar rulers of the erstwhile Mysore State, in nurturing and fostering all forms of art is all too well documented. Elsewhere too it was the royalty that fostered art. Post independence the emerging Indian industry led by the titans, art once again found patronage.

But in Mysore, the cultural heritage city, the lacunae left by the Wadiyar kings led to a period of stagnation with art being left orphaned by lack of patronage. It is high time, Mysore needs a cultural resurgence that would reinvigorate involvement of people in contemporary art. 

Ramsons Kala Pratishtana (RKP) has taken a proactive approach to bring back the hoary tradition of art connoisseurship in Mysore. Kalaa Dhaaraa - An exhibition of Contemporary Art, conceptualised by RKP, is a visual extravaganza of contemporary works of art done by more than 90 artists from across Karnataka. Artists featured in the exhibition have used various mediums to reflect their inner visions. The idea is to invite the viewer to partake in mental experiment with time and space, make quantum leaps to parallel worlds and of course wildly imaginative explorations of what is real and what is not !

In the beginning artworks of 15 artists will go on display. The duration of more than 75 days of exhibition is punctuated, five times at the interval of roughly a fortnight, with a lecture each on a senior artist. During each intermission, artworks of 15 new artists will be added to the repertoire of the exhibition.

Various media like water colours, acrylics, oils, papers and mixed media are used to create landscapes, traditional art, Mysore style, Surpur miniatures, line drawings, pen-and-ink, abstracts, contemporary art and collages. More than 150 works of art that will be on display are genuine original creations (excluding Mysore style paintings) of respective artists. Most of them are well within affordable price range for general public. 

Kalaa Dhaaraa is Mysore’s largest ever art exhibition offering the connoisseur and the layman to own a piece of art. This is mecca of contemporary art of Karntaka. You are welcome to Kalaa Dhaaraa.