NEWSMAKER
The spirit of sport
MITA KAPUR
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Sculptor Ankit Patel’s work conveys the need to reinvent the ancient Indian attitude to sports.
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Triumph rises out of failure. Defeat can be turned into victory. Such moments are eternal, such moments serve as synonyms for life. Ankit Patel watched the Indian hockey team face failure. He took to rebuilding an equation of sport with life. The inherent link between the two was fused by the artist in his sculptures.
Two of Ankit’s sculptures have been chosen by Olympic Fine Arts Committee to be housed in their permanent museum and will be on display during the Beijing Olympic Games, 2008.
His art is never conceived in a vacuum, it’s an outcome of visual imageries. The village near Surat, where he grew up, gives him most of his imagination. Simplicity comes from his rustic roots that others find romantic. The floating, lyrical rhythm of rural life is intensified within his mind space.
Ankit’s creation of Kinetic Art incorporates actual movement as a part of design and his ‘sporty sculptures’ are about balance, speed, motion and movement.
Inspiration
“The inspiration for these 15 pieces comes from the acrobatic sports that were performed during a mela in my village. It originates and has its roots in the traditional Tamasha, which served as a form of playful revelry in most villages of India, each lending its regional flavour to typify it. Sports sculpt the body, intensify the pulse, strengthen the mind,” said Ankit.
The traditional rural games and the spirit of simply playing for entertainment make Ankit’s ‘mobiles’ speak of earthy charm, emotions are let loose in fluid motions. Simplicity and Freedom are mated. Ankit answered, “can you think of a piece of art that changes every time you look at it ?’
The seven and a half feet statue of a father and son playing with a ball, with the child reaching out and stretching beyond the limits of his stature, are symbols of the spirit of sport and of the give and take between the two generations. This along with ‘Team Work’ has been chosen for the Olympic games this year. ‘Team Work’ conveys the play at ball and also a synchronisation with each other in the game of life. In its stillness, the sculpted piece speaks of the desire to win, to reach out.
“Mallakambh is an old Maharashtrian game that required a person to climb a long cylindrical pole and perform his exercises on it. It has been portrayed in my sculpture in four different stances,” he added. The tension in the muscles is conveyed with calm repose. The mind, body and spirit are in perfect alignment.
Walking on stilts during a mela was a common sport. It was also used for a village crier to make announcements and advertise activities as well. Two poles juxtaposed together held by a rod, which was used for walking from one to another, required tremendous balancing skills. It is also representative of the theatrical tradition of nautanki.
Symbolic
If the Greeks felt deeply about the indispensability of sports and the Celtics were an athletic race, Indian sporting instincts also go back to ancient times. Ankit’s sculptures convey the need to revisit and re-inspire ourselves.
In his ‘Game of Life’ and ‘Reaching Beyond’, the kinetic energy is symbolic of the how the human being arches, curves, changes his posture to acquire, win and move on in life. A playfulness, a willingness to burst forth, comes out in ‘Swingers’. One can almost hear a whoop of joy as the body swings, its arms balancing the upside down pose. There is a sense of escape into the joys of playing and enjoying, it seems like a heartfelt appeal to return to our love for sport.
In ‘Circle of Life’ and ‘The Game’, Ankit has captured the unflinching spirit for playing the game. The bodies are in rhythm and energy flows from one to another, the nexus of control and power comes into play. ‘Freedom’ makes a statement, of a step taken, a push, a surge to move forward, doggedly determined. These sculptures speak, they are examples of how soundless voices can translate the feeling through a movement cast in mould, the textures worked in bronze.
Balanced over a hurdle, holding a ball, conquering heights ’Crossing Hurdles’ is the quintessential expression of playing the game. Primeval vibrations from life are used as a creative force, just lifting moments as they happen and holding them is his `cast’. The deliberate effort makes his men, women and children look spontaneous. View each piece from any angle; it is complete.
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