Contemporary Chinese: No

In London there are somewhat dueling exhibitions of hot collecting categories, Contemporar Indian and Chinese art. The Evening Standard‘s Ben Lewis takes the coincidence as an opportunity to validate Indian art:

The global contemporary art boom of the past decade has produced substantial contemporary art scenes in the swiftly growing economies of India and China, and you can see survey shows of both these worlds in London at the moment — one at the Serpentine and one at the Saatchi Gallery. But what a difference a bit of curating can make! Everything that Saatchi gets wrong in his Chinese show, the Serpentine gets right in its Indian one. While the Duke of York’s Barracks show is a chart of the cheesiest Chinese auction-house hits, the Serpentine is a treasure trove of subtlety and surprise. [ . . . ]

The Serpentine show takes a careful look at the Indian contemporary art scene, and instead of attempting an overarching survey, presents an essayistic tour of a handful of contrasting artists. [ . . . ]

Lewis falls hard for Subodh Gupta’s Indian courtroom re-assembled at the Serpentine gallery. He finds it a refreshing contrast to Gupta’s increasingly iconic stainless steek cookware paintings and sculpture:

I had become rather disillusioned by all the repetitive pots-and-pans pieces I’d see by Gupta over the past few years, and I loathe the terrible spin-off photorealist paintings of the same kitchenware which have been on show in every auction preview. The new work shows what resources this artist can tap as long as he doesn’t pander to the tastes of his dimwitted market of millionaire collectors.

New Stars in Indian Highway (This is London)