KGS: Nowadays, an artist uses various media, like the multimedia work I do, and it’s not seen as a reflection on their abilities. But it was different at one time. Painters thought they had to stick to painting, sculptors believed they had to work in stone — things like that. A sculptor, for instance, wouldn’t have considered making a papier-mâché sculpture. Similarly, painters felt they should only draw and paint, and that was it. When I started using different materials, many people probably thought, ‘Is this man an artisan or an artist?’ But that’s not really the case.

In fact, even in the European art scene, Picasso was prolific in exploring this. He tried all kinds of media and discovered different avenues through them. He didn’t just impose his own approach on the material; he worked with it. For example, when he made a sculpture or worked on a plate, he understood what we might call the ‘dharma of the medium’ — what the material inherently possesses. He utilised that quality. To some extent, my use of different media is similar. Each medium has its own language, and when you use it in the right way, you get more than what you contribute. The medium becomes your accomplice. It’s not something external that you’re simply trying to master; it’s a collaborator in your creative process.

For example, a jockey’s horse isn’t just something he rides — it’s his accomplice. Likewise, for a cricketer, the bat isn’t just a tool; it’s an extension of his skill. If he doesn’t understand how to wield the bat properly, he’s not going to be a great batsman. The same applies to art. Each medium you use becomes an accomplice in your expression. Of course, it’s possible to use a medium poorly. (smiles). The point is, unlike winning a race or a match, being a painter or sculptor doesn’t have immediate consequences if you use a medium badly because no one may notice it. But if you use a medium successfully, you discover new dimensions in your work.

KGS: Well, I don’t know if they have drawn inspiration or not. I haven’t theorised too much because I don’t want to construct a rigid theoretical framework that becomes like one of those heavy structures you have to carry around. Every time I try to explain certain issues to myself, and if I talk or write about them, they get published. It’s not a continuous theory of any kind, but if people have been influenced by what I’ve written. I suppose they have learned how to think for themselves rather than just reading books from Europe or America.

There are various things... People still talk so much about postcolonialism, but in our country, there’s still a considerable postcolonial hangover. It manifests in a deceptive way. You might be very nationalistic and talk about your country, but when thinking about where the country should move, people tend to believe it should follow the path the West has taken. So, this hangover is still very much present. It’s always worthwhile to take a close look at what we have and see if there’s another explanation. That’s where I might have influenced a few people.

One of the first things my initial book aimed to do was show that modern art in India shouldn’t be compared with modern art in Europe. It’s a different kind of growth. There are issues modern art in the West has dealt with that we don’t necessarily face in India. For instance, in the West, artists had to break away from Renaissance art, which was tied to visual reality or ‘retinal reality,’ as they saw it. This wasn’t the case in India. Even in Indian philosophy, the notion of reality as something ‘out there’ wasn’t as prominent. Indian thought has often seen what you perceive as a kind of veil for the true reality behind it.

So, if people have been influenced by me, perhaps it’s in understanding that Indian modernism has its own trajectory. As for the whole Modern-Postmodern debate, my view differs from the mainstream. To me, Modernism isn’t a style; it’s the result of cultural globalisation. When people from different parts of the world come together, encountering diverse ways of thinking, speaking, and living, they reinterpret what they already know. That’s how modernist movements, whether in science or literature, emerged — from rethinking.

In a way, modernism created a tradition of breaking tradition. Every time you use something, you ask, “Is this the right thing for me?” So there’s always a critical element. But many modern theorists believed modernism was a new dawn, a step forward in some kind of evolutionary scale, leading to a society with a more expressive language. They thought there was no going back, and the past wasn’t worth much.

Then they realised that cutting off the past wasn’t sustainable, even linguistically. Every language has a history. We didn’t invent these languages, and they come with a past. So, really, some people have started to see Modernism as an overstatement. The past has a lot to offer, but it’s never exhausted. We interpret it anew each time. Just like how Einstein built on Newtonian theory, there may still be truths in older ideas that will resurface. So, Postmodernism, to me, is about moving away from the dogmatism of Modernism. Unfortunately, many people see Postmodernism as another rigid theory.

I’ve also written about the relationship between artists and artisans. In today’s terms, we could talk about the ‘democratisation of art,’ though it doesn’t mean lowering it to the level of the common man. It means recognising that many things happening around us among the public are, in themselves, a source of art. People with limited resources still find their own ways of creating beauty, and that’s art in its own right. There’s a levelling of the language of art — it’s not always in the ivory tower, but also on the street. I’ve written about this here and there, though not in a connected statement, and also about art education, social issues, and other things. If some people have been affected by it, I’m happy.

KGS: If a practising artist becomes a very serious teacher, he is committing a kind of suicide. But then, people like me, who were both practising artists and teachers, only pretended to teach. Luckily, I had behind me a whole group of teachers who didn’t believe in teaching at all. In fact, when I studied at Santiniketan, it was under the shadow of Tagore’s ideas, who believed that art cannot be taught. I mean, if there is a young person with talent, you can encourage them or place them in an environment where they can grow on their own. Tagore had this idea that an emerging artist, like a caterpillar, creates a cocoon around themselves. When they are ready, they cut the cocoon and emerge as a butterfly. That was his image of how an artist is made.

First, the artist encounters the world, then retreats into a phase of growth, and finally, emerges transformed. But another teacher, Nandalal Bose, had a different idea of what an artist is. He wasn’t as individualistic and believed that practice plays a crucial role. He thought that if you isolate yourself in a cocoon, you won’t learn enough. He had another analogy: when a village potter is working, he uses a wheel and a stick to keep it spinning. At first, the wheel wobbles, but as it steadies, the potter is able to shape something from it. Similarly, an artist must allow for some initial wobbling before reaching a steady point where real growth happens. Practice, he believed, was essential, and you have to take advantage of those steady moments.

Teaching is like that too. The most a teacher can do is give students an impetus — a sense of how serious their profession is and how they shouldn’t take others’ praise or criticism at face value. They must be their own critic. I don’t know if this still holds true today, but that was the idea. Another thing about teaching... when I was interviewed in Delhi some time ago, I recalled a Sanskrit shloka. Sanskrit contains verses for almost every occasion. The verse describes how under a spreading Banyan tree, a young-looking teacher sits with old-looking pupils, and all their questions are answered by his silence. I said I was that kind of teacher. The relationship between a teacher and a student cannot be measured by time alone.

Some years ago, when I was in London, I met Peter de Francia, who had visited India once or twice. He had been the teacher of many of my students at the Royal College of Art. We were having lunch with two of my students, Dhruv Mistry and Sheela Gowda, and Peter asked me, “How much time do you dedicate to teaching?” I told him he could ask my students. I said probably ten meetings a year. He was quite surprised. “Ten meetings a year? We’re slogging here six days a week!” I replied, “You don’t need to. In fact, what you’re doing isn’t really getting through. You’re just trying to satisfy yourself or others by showing that you’re doing a good job. But if you truly want to influence people’s thinking or their vision, it doesn’t take a lot of time. You never know when it might work. If it works, it works. Why overexert yourself?”

As far as teaching art goes, the key is having the right environment. I’ve spoken about this elsewhere, saying that an art school should be like a rainforest. You shouldn’t disturb the environment; let everything grow on its own. The environment should have educational biodiversity, where students can learn from everything around them without being forced. In a regular school, children must be trained and given the tools of perception and thinking. But in an art school, it should be more like the rainforest — organic, diverse, and self-sustaining.

KGS: Actually, I haven’t returned to Santiniketan that often. I left after my studies in 1951, and between then and 1980, I only visited once or twice briefly. I was mostly away. Then the people at Santiniketan invited me back, saying, “You’ve spent so many years here; why don’t you return?” So I considered it. At the time, I was living in a growing industrial town and wanted to spend my old age somewhere halfway between a town and a village, and Santiniketan seemed like the right place. I stayed there for 25 years, but now I’ve come back to Baroda for a few reasons. Santiniketan is becoming more urbanised, and my daughter lives in Bombay, so I want to be near her. In Baroda, I also have a kind of rainforest around me, filled with my former students. They’re all older now, but they still take care of me. So that’s why I’m here. Besides, I have little to do with the town. Whenever I want, I can drive in and then return.

 

KGS: I don’t know. Everyone asks you that question. How would I know? 

 

KGS: Ah! To be honest, if you ask anyone born in the 1920s or 1910s, none of their families wanted them to become an artist. It wasn’t that there wasn’t any artistic talent around or that people didn’t pursue it, but it just wasn’t seen as a desirable path. I was probably noticed as someone who liked to scribble and draw quite early on, even before I went to school. In fact, I started school rather late because I was apparently a sickly child. I had recurring scabies. I first joined what was called the first standard — back then, we had standards and forms.

Some of the early memories I have from my childhood are of temples, temple chariots, and the carvings on the small temples in Kerala. Then there was Theyyam, Kathakali, and similar performances. I still occasionally think in terms of their theatrics. But how much of that remains in present-day Kerala, I’m not sure. Someone did mention to me recently that it’s all still there.

 

KGS: That’s right. To what extent it is I don’t know. Then I grew up in a place called Mahe. 

 

 

KGS: So, in a sense, it was a kind of underground in those days — underground for people who wanted to drink liquor, underground for smugglers, and underground for certain political activists whom the British government did not want around. In that way, I had that kind of exposure. When I was in school, I was already exposed to Marxist groups and similar movements, and I became involved in active politics soon after. I left school and studied at St. Aloysius College in Mangalore. Like many others, I then went to Madras Presidency College to study Economics and got involved in student politics. It was the time of the Quit India movement, and eventually, I ended up in jail.

 

KGS: In fact, at that time, getting arrested was a big deal. India was on the path to independence, and there was a lot of idealism — people were ready to pay any price for it. The people who were in jail with me were probably the cream of the Madras colleges of that era. My situation was different. I had a ban from Presidency College, so I couldn’t return after being released from jail. I also had an interest in art, which eventually led me to Santiniketan. It was incidental. Yes, I wanted to paint, but many of my other friends later returned to their studies or found good jobs and held prominent positions. For instance, one of my close friends, Ravi N., became the Chief Secretary of Tamil Nadu, and Ramunni Menon, who is likely still around, was the Additional Chief Secretary of Kerala. Many others ended up in places like the International Monetary Fund and similar institutions.

Years later, I had a friend in Delhi who was the secretary to Acharya Kripalani. Whenever I visited, he would gather all these people, whom he called “goats,” and we’d have a “goats party.” It was interesting, but all that idealism is hard to find in present-day India. The reality is, it existed back then. Unless there is another wave of idealism where people are willing to do whatever they can to change the country, nothing will happen here. As I mentioned earlier, cultural globalism was the foundation of Modernism, which is a good thing, but economic globalism is rooted in exploitation. In this way, they are turning us into slaves. If the world is to be saved, the rich and the poor must come together and think in terms of sustainable prosperity for everyone. But that seems unlikely, especially given how people in the United States behave. Economic globalism and exploitation go hand in hand, and this exploitation cannot be resisted unless the resistance comes from within. It’s not like the Marxist belief that resistance will arise solely from the working class. This kind of resistance is ideological — it won’t happen just due to social circumstances. If such a vision exists among the youth and they come together, maybe there’s hope...

KGS: There’s no real connection. Honestly, I didn’t have much interest in economics. The study of economics at that time didn’t have much relevance to our country. All the economic theories — supply and demand, and so on — were there, but the question was whether we were simply subject to these forces or whether we, as human beings, could influence and monitor these balances. That’s why economics without politics didn’t make much sense to me. Back then, it was just pure economics. Even today, when you think about the people discussing economic theory, there are two groups: one consists of those who win Nobel Prizes and treat economics as a self-supporting science, and the other consists of those who think in terms of human values and the kind of system we should have. That’s why it took Amartya Sen so many years to win the Nobel Prize — he wasn’t the most favoured. So that kind of economics never really appealed to me. In fact, I was more interested in literature than economics. Of course, being interested in literature might seem a bit innocent, but if I had pursued literature, I might not have become an artist. I might have become a writer instead! (laughs).