Amalgamating the old and the new and unravelling the mysticism, artist Vineet Kacker’s ceramic works has a metaphoric slide seamlessly blending into his art. His recent solo exhibition titled “Should I look for You, Should I lose myself” is based on his personal engagement with mystical philosophies.
An architect by education, his shift as a ceramic artist was very gradual. Vineet is a Fulbright scholar and loves to mix different techniques. On display are around 30 ceramic installations by the artist. Talking about his inspiration Vineet says, “My work is inspired by my travels through the high Himalayan regions. It draws upon art and architecture that refers the sacred. Though not aligned to any particular established tradition or religion, the work is born out of an active personal engagement with the eastern philosophies. It is also inspired by the organic nature and incremental growth of informal street shrines all over the Indian subcontinent, where associations of faith, often contested, have the ability to transform the meaning of ordinary objects.”
Adding to him, Anu Bajaj, director Gallery Art Positive says, “The interplay of experiences that thread time, mind and transcendence is evident in his works.”
Vineet feels that in all spiritual traditions, two distinct paths are suggested to those who seek enlightenment. “One is the path of prescribed practices, guiding rules and tenets. The path of gyana, which uses engagement with spiritual texts and practices to gradually deepen the understanding of the practitioner. The other path is of bhakti,” he adds.
He continues, “While gyana is likened to learning how to swim — as one’s technique develops, one can navigate with ease waters that seemed mysterious, unknowable, even threatening. Bhakti, on the other hand, is the willingness to surrender all that one holds dear to oneself, without worrying about the consequences.”
His work titled ‘Silence–Violence’, explores the seeds of both the elements present within every human being; whereas ‘Topographies of a Formless World’ is the artist’s representation of a formless world best understood from an elevation. Another work of his titled ‘The Architecture of Dissolution’ is a series of stupas that are reliquaries built for ones who have been able to attain a state of dissolution of their individual identity. “The work represents the indeterminable distance between aspiration and alchemy are tableaus that are travelogues through an indeterminable landscape,” shares the artist
Most of his works are based on an engagement with certain ideas and philosophies. Vineet states, “The actual process of making is very tactile, very alive — one in which the maker can take a backseat to the process of creativity. I enjoy this direct engagement that clay as a material affords. For the duration of my time in my studio, I am in another world. Its only later that one assembles the different parts, or engages with other processes like firing, incorporates other materials — one witnesses an idea, almost ephemeral, being transformed into an tangible work.”
