Riyas Komu. Oil’s Well, Let’s Play!

curated by Marco Meneguzzo
October 20, 2010 - January 30, 2011
Fondazione Arnaldo Pomodoro, Via Solari 35, Milano

For the second installment of the Project Room—the space dedicated to emerging young artists, in partnership with UniCreditGroup—the Foundation presents the installation Oil’s Well, Let’s Play! (2007) by Riyas Komu (Kerala, India, 1971), curated by Marco Meneguzzo.

Oil’s Well, Let’s Play! consists of a series of moving sculptures, featuring a sort of Trojan horse drawn on elaborate carved wooden legs that evoke the Hindu tradition of Ratha, representing the moment when the gods exit the temple in procession to bestow their blessing. From this figure, which resembles a grid, takes shape a geographical map of the world outlining the global hegemonies of America, Iraq, and the Middle Eastern conflict.

This installation by Komu – says Marco Meneguzzo – is an allegorical/symbolic representation, and includes skulls, carts, maps, metamorphoses, grates that are both prisons and windows: whether we want to or not, whether we realize it or not, we recognize a world of oppressors and a world of the oppressed, a dark and grim image of ongoing destruction, against which the only defense is the artist’s icon as exorcist—one who understands and is able to reveal the future, yet can only rely on the saving power of art.

Riyas Komu, an Indian Muslim sculptor living in Mumbai – continues Meneguzzo – does not want to engage with the subtleties of the language of art. However, he wants to say something through this language: his motivation is ethical, not aesthetic, and for this reason he consciously takes the risk of being a moralist. His struggle against dominant ideologies (and perhaps in favor of some emerging ideas) is so clear as to be almost didactic, but it comes from a world that is still allowed to be naive, provided it respects the rules of its naivety. For many, this is globalization in art… for many, this is globalization tout court.