BY SOURAV DUTTA

Indian visual art started getting closer to the European modern art movements sometime in the 1960s and 70s. Until then, most of India’s best-known visual artists, like Jamini Roy and Nandalal Bose, primarily drew their inspiration from Indian folk traditions or frescoes of an earlier era, as seen in the caves of Ajanta and Ellora.

However, the liberalization of the economy in the 1990s truly helped align Indian contemporary art with global trends. Indian artworks after this period were regularly displayed at international shows, and we saw the rise of a host of new artists whose works spoke a more global language and whose concerns could be understood by people from outside India as well.

One of the most interesting among this new breed of artists is Devajyoti Ray, who, in the early 2000s, came up with a new concept called Pseudorealism. It was primarily a reaction to the rapidly expanding media space in India post-1991, which is officially recognized as the year when the country was liberalized.

Until this time, India had only two television channels that catered to a kind of sanitized news for an audience that was not much exposed to global media. However, post-1991, as the economy opened up to the world, India saw a rapid expansion of news channels, which now number close to 500. They broadcast news often from very contradictory points of view, making it difficult to discern which one is telling the truth.

This is, in fact, the crux of Pseudorealism—Devajyoti Ray’s style of art that shows how it is possible to create something completely artificial and still make it believable.

This October, Ray’s works will be showcased in the city of Bangalore in an exhibition designed to trace the evolution of contemporary art from all over the world, but from a pseudorealistic angle. The event is already creating a lot of buzz, as is the series of talks to be held alongside the exhibition. The talks will feature some of the city’s best-known designers, architects, writers, and film personalities who will express their views on contemporary art and aesthetics as practiced in the post-liberalized India of today.

As winter sets in, Bangalore is gearing up for more art shows and literary events, which are slowly becoming a regular feature of the city every year. The burgeoning new elite class of Bangalore—migrants from all over the country and outside the country as well—laps up these events with great enthusiasm.

An event like Devajyoti Ray’s show would not have found much of an audience a decade ago in Bangalore. But today, the city is fast becoming an alternative hub of avant-garde art in the country alongside Mumbai and New Delhi.

About the author: Sourav Dutta is a seasoned professional with deep expertise in public speaking, corporate leadership, and entrepreneurship. He is a professional keynote speaker who has delivered keynote speeches globally, including in the USA, Australia, and Singapore, and regularly speaks at premier institutions such as IIMs and IITs in India and several US Ivy League universities.

Sourav is the founder of Practive, an EduTech startup that provides consulting services to small and medium businesses. Sourav also specializes in soft skills training, helping individuals and organizations enhance their communication and leadership skills. With a strong corporate background, Sourav has held senior leadership roles in analytics, strategy, and data science, and has been a visiting faculty member at MICA Ahmedabad and the Image Consulting Business Institute.