Perhaps it is the idea that taste and views are always subjective and can never be fully objective, not matter how hard we try, which makes the profession of the critic questionable in some people's minds. In various media, from art to music to film, we often have cases when the opinions of the critics and the audience are very different, resulting in the question of what the actual task of a critic is, especially when he or she does not contribute or divert from what is considered mainstream or the view of the majority. While you might think the answer is obvious, it also leads to the concept of a critic as a whole, because being critical about a work of art is a skill everyone has, but when it comes to writing essays or reviews about it, we are talking about a profession with a certain academic background. It is, however, in the contemplation about art, thinking about ways to approach it and offering them to the reader which makes the critic unique, and what makes the difference between criticism and a review on Amazon.
“The Museum of Imagination” is streaming on MUBI
Often critics have contributed profoundly to our understanding of a work of art, and have at times even intervened when a feature, a painting or a piece of music was in danger of being forgotten. In his short documentary “The Museum of Imagination”, Indian director Amit Dutta talks about the critic, specifically about the process of contemplation as a necessary means to approach art, by focusing on the contributions of renowned art critic and historian B. N. Goswamy. The feature, which screened at the Film Festival Rotterdam as well as Vienne International Film Festival in 2013, is based on a series of interviews with Goswamy dealing with his work, the importance of Indian art and the special status of Indian artist Nainsukh, whose work is of particular interest to Goswamy.
While you might expect the statements of Goswamy taking center stage in “The Museum of Imagination”, Dutta has chosen a very different and interesting approach. Rather than the words of the critic, his silence is what dominates the 20 minutes of the documentary for the most part, the breaks between sentences or moments of contemplation before giving an answer. Dutta uses those “spaces” to insert various images of Indian art, mostly taken from Goswamy's numerous publications on the subject, as well as a number of statements taken from these essays and works, as if following the process of contemplation of the critic in that particular moment. This stream-of-consciousness is further emphasized by the creative sound design which makes some of the images come to life, such as the cries of animals adding depth to a mural of Krishna killing the horse-demon.
One of the central statements by Goswamy is how images constitute his memory, especially of his childhood, and therefore have laid the foundation of the “museum of imagination”, as he calls it. Through his audiovisual, associative collages, Dutta attempts to give his viewer an idea of this “museum”, an impression of what it must be like to walk through it, but also the thought process of the critic when he approaches art. Essentially, the director creatively and rather impressively highlights the skill of people like Goswamy viewing art through this versatile mirror of memory, experience and knowledge of art, thus resulting in a unique way of perceiving it, which is precisely the task of a good critic.
In conclusion, “The Museum of Imagination” is a fascinating documentary about the task of the critic and the profound experience of contemplating about art. Amit Dutta manages to highlight B. N. Goswamy's contribution to the world of art and its perception, but also invites us to take part in the thought process, in the contemplation about art itself.
