Photo: Sheikh Mehedi Morshed

The four-day South Asian art extravaganza Dhaka Art Summit concluded on February 8. Nadia Samdani, president and co-founder of Samdani Art Foundation, offered this correspondent an insight into the significance of diverse facets and expressions of contemporary art of South-Asia and beyond; the role of international curators and artistic directors and gigantic preparatory tasks to hold such a grand art summit. Excerpts:     

“This is the largest non-commercial and research-based South Asian art platform. This year, 300 artists, 11 international curators, 600 overseas art connoisseurs, over 50 international media representatives, students from 50 schools and around 1.3 lakh art enthusiasts take part.”

“As our country doesn't have any contemporary art museum and the trend of contemporary art is on the rise around the world, we have been arranging this biennale summit for the last three editions. The event is free and ticketless as we want more audience to get attract and appreciate art. This is our country's event and we together would like to make our arts and artists reach beyond border.”

“For the last two years, Diana Campbell Betancourt, artistic director and chief curator of the summit, with 10 other international curators conducted research and maintained frequent contacts with artists, collectors, curators and organisers to get introduced with the ambiance of the venue (Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy) and the artists of the region to select their works for display. We remodeled the entire venue anew with carpeting, air-conditioning, lighting, making precincts and hardboard walls and distempering. The preparation for the next summit, to be held in 2018, is also on the way from now on.”

“This event is like a pop-up museum for four days. I use the word 'pop-up museum' because when we visit museums abroad, we watch all types of works. Here we also arranged diverse expressions of arts: apart from art exhibitions, there were display of architectural designs, a film programme, children's workshop, book launch and more.”

“The event is international in nature, quality, standard and the largest with regard to its arrangement. The profiles of the discussant panel were extremely high. They are actually the cream of art and are dominating the international art world.”

“The third edition had many interesting and thought-provoking art pieces on display. This event has definitely augmented our country's image and we hope to continue this endeavour with active support and cooperation from our government. We expect the international audience will be more interested in the next Dhaka Art Summits.”