Delhi Art Gallery unintimidated by 'moral police' over nude art

Two days after the Delhi Art Gallery shut down following protests by the women’s wing of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad - Durga Vahini, the owner of the art gallery Ashish Anand said he would not be cowed down and the exhibition will run as planned.

"We’ll continue with the same exhibition and nothing is going to change. The exhibition will continue till 15 March. Whatever Husain has painted is the depiction of a human body, there are no gods and godesses, no vulgar manner, so there is no reason why we should be removing Husain’s paintings from the exhibition," Anand said in an interview to Editor-in-Chief of CNN-IBN Rajdeep Sardesai.

The VHP, however, has refused to budge and are likely to hold protests at the venue on Wednesday.

In the same interview, VHP spokesperson Vinod Bansal said, “We are democratic people and we are expressing feelings in a democratic manner. Our organisation only came into the picture when the administrative machinery failed.”

“In the light of Delhi’s gangrape, this kind of immoral act which depicts women as a sex object should not be allowed,” said Sanjana Chaudhary, state convener of Durga Vahini.

According to the protesters, who want a ban on the exhibition and the organisers arrested, the ‘indecent pictures’ showed women as a mere commodity, and the nude and obscene paintings portrayed women in bad light.

The exhibition, titled ‘The Naked and the Nude’ which opened on Saturday showcases around 250 works by various artists.

In Bangalore, paintings of Delhi-based artist Anirudh Sainath Krishnamani which were on display at the Chitra Kala Parishath were taken off fearing protests.

Interestingly, the exhibition was inaugurated by the Governor of Karnataka HR Bhardwaj.

Soon after the inauguration, the artist said he began receiving calls saying some of the paintings were ‘objectionable’ and they needed to be taken down.

After an advisory by the police the ‘offending paintings’ were taken down on February 4.

After the paintings were removed, Sainath told IBNLive, “It seemed some person had an issue with my paintings. He lodged a complaint with the police station. We’ve heard the person is from the BJP.”