A carousel of hybrid abstracts

Interview with renowned artist and polymath Raghava K K who aims to democratise art with his multi-dimensional show on a social media platform.

In 2020, when the world was brought to a grinding halt, Raghava K K’s mind started thinking of walking down new avenues. The year also saw the internationally famed artist celebrate his 40th birthday and complete 25 years in the world of art. In always looking to do something different, Raghava came up with an online art exhibition in collaboration with Anto Philip’s Under25 Studios.

Called Eye Candy, this art show on Instagram, complete with videos, reels, carousel posts and live sessions, strives to reach out to a larger audience, and as Raghava says, “not just serious art lovers, collectors and gallerists, but also people who care about art. The idea was to democratise art by making it more affordable and meaningful to the common man.”

Needless to say, he is very happy with the response. “Through this, one has observed a marked shift in the way people are looking at art, distribution, sales, etc. And it’s exciting to see youngsters participate in art,” says the self-taught artist whose works find a pride of place in the collections of cricketer Sachin Tendulkar, Amazon-CEO Jeff Bezos, former Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto, Princess Lalla Salma of Morocco and actors Amitabh Bachchan, Kamal Hassan and Shah Rukh Khan, among others. Excerpts from an interview:

How would you define yourself as an artist?

I don’t define myself as a medium-based artist, but as one who wants to create a certain kind of consciousness in the world. This consciousness could be an idea or vision and when that translates itself into art, you use a medium that lends itself best to it. For example, if I want to create something chaotic, I would use a medium that would allow for chaos to exist. Or if I want to do something exact, then I would use a more exacting medium. For me, paints, technology and other tools are those of transcendence, which with their own individual temperament, serve a mood and purpose.

How did your experiments with art begin?

My journey of art, in retrospect, seems to parallel the history of art itself. I began as a cartoonist because I could draw and with line drawing being the core of my practice, I started playing with blacks and whites. With time, the lines became more dramatic and I found myself moving into a world of hues, using watercolours that I feel are a very temperamental, free-flowing medium, for the next phase of my work. Since I was not well-versed with the use of brushes, I began working with my hands and feet and that lent a certain individuality to my work.

Then came a point when I felt that my paintings were all about dancers, but they didn’t dance, so I blended figures of dancers into my work. This saw me move towards performance art that over a period of time developed into multiple projects, including one in which I did the art direction for the backdrop of an opera — Beethoven’s Fidelio in Milwaukee — a performance piece using interactive technology. It showed how art can change with the use of technology.

My earlier works with lines, black and white as well as colour, where I was painting with my hands and feet — when they were about love, travel, people, etc., — were more emotional. However, I felt that they did not have conceptual content, so I started playing around with concepts and discovered Photoshop. Purposely manipulating my compositions using the photoshop technology helped me understand digital production, which I feel started making my works more conceptual.

Your father has had quite a role in encouraging you to do your own thing...

Yes, actually, we come from a fairly philosophical family. One day, it so happened that when my father made a statement — that all our textbooks had been hijacked by the Industrial Revolution and whatever was being taught to students was mainly about memorising things verbatim and spitting them all out during the examination — it struck a chord. He said that although there was a lot of education happening, there was no learning really.

So one day, I used his philosophy against him and told him I wanted to have a more holistic education instead of this formal one. I managed to convince him to let me take a one-year sabbatical which, incidentally, continues till date. But, before that of course, I had to finish my class XII exams, which I did and fared reasonably well too.

Going by the number of legendary artists you’ve worked with, any experiences you’d like to share?

There are many, but the one I remember most fondly is my meeting with folk-rock artiste Paul Simon who is also part of the legendary Simon & Garfunkel-duo. Since I soundtrack my childhood to Paul, that first meeting — he had asked me to meet him at Times Square — was special. As we talked, he asked me to do an artwork for an album launch and I can still recall how the moment I heard that, my heart sank. For me, collaboration is something where two individuals meet as equals and are comfortable to mess with each other’s space. When I voiced my apprehension to him — that nowhere am I close to being the legend that he is — Paul said that he’d then think of something where we can safely meet as equals. We did work soon and now share a very special relationship — not just in the work space, but also with each other’s families. I last did a painting for his concert, ‘Still Crazy After All These Years’ in New York. Looking at him, I feel that if I can still be as crazy as he is at his age, it’ll be an achievement worth celebrating.