Biennale ‘art car’ auction to start off on Monday

TechnoparkToday.com ( July, 2013) >> So, who will buy the famed ‘art car’? And, for what price?

The only suspense that continues to hang over the first Kochi-Muziris biennale will end at 8 pm on July 30, as a much-touted and hand-painted Tata Nano will be auctioned off four months after the conclusion of India’s first such contemporary-art extravaganza.

The 24-hour-long online bidding on www.saffronart.com, slated to start at 8 pm (IST) on July 29, is being hosted by Saffronart, the country’s largest auction house, according to the Kochi Biennale Foundation (KBF).

The event bears pan-Indian significance considering that this would be the country’s first art car auction. Round the globe, late English musician John Lennon and American singer-songwriter Janis Joplin have driven them. American artist Jeff Koons, Andy Warhol and English painter-photographer David Hockney have painted them. But, it took 2012 for India to see one.

“We had chosen the Nano because it is the common man’s car,” said artist Bose Krishnamachari, co-curator of the 96-day biennale which showcased works of 90-odd artists from within India and abroad at 14 venues around Kochi before it ended on March 17.

Krishnamachari, a Mumbai-based Malayali who coloured the serene-white vehicle, said he had used “maximum colours possible” in the four-day exercise that began on February 14 after megastar Mohanlal handed over to him the self-signed Nano at a crowded roadside function in this city. The 50-year-old artist included the work, titled ‘Maximum Nano’, under his renowned series Stretched Bodies.

“I used automotive paint. That will ensure the longevity of the work. We have got it laminated as well,” adds Krishnamachari, who is also president of the 2010-registered KBF.

The car was moved on to suburban Edappally a day after the biennale. It has since been exhibited in the plush Lulu Mall.

KBF Head of Programmes and Digital Development Shwetal Patel said the proceeds from the upcoming auction would be a means to raise funds for the first chapter of the biennale that began on 12/12/12.

On its part, the 2000-founded Saffronart chose to call the ‘art car’ as an installation. It will be auctioned with a zero reserve price — the bidding starts at a mere Rs. 100,” Shivajirao Gaekwar of the Mumbai-based auction house said. This was “keeping in line with Bose’s well-known abstract idiom, this vivid, drivable installation evokes the myriad colours and emotions of India”.

The vehicle was donated to the KBF by Coffee Beanz of this city and La Gallery 360 of Thiruvananthapuram.