"I love associating myself with any event that goes above and beyond just selling art… Selling a piece in a normal show is good…But if the piece sells, and that amount is used for a noble purpose, then that’s the ultimate reason for art and artists to exist on this planet,” narrated sculptor-scrapturist Arzan Khambatta to Parsiana on August 16, 2021. Khambatta was the lead artist, with ceramicist Adil Writer and miniaturist Rusi Bharucha, who came together to spread awareness about India’s elephants at an exhibition titled "Little Trunkets.” The fundraising exhibition at Bombay’s Gallery Art and Soul from August 12 to September 12, 2021 is bringing together over 100 paintings, sculptures, and ceramic works from about 80 leading artists.
"When asked by the Gallery whether I would like to be one of the main artists in the show to raise funds for saving the elephants and their habitat in collaboration with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), I jumped to it,” said the ever-exuberant Khambatta. He calls his five baby elephants, designed in different postures, "all mischievous,” his "playful pachyderms… My intent was to humanize the elephant… to make them cute and friendly, playful, and loving… Viewers should be inspired to put them in their homes, on their office desks, in their rock gardens,” he stated. "I hope that this effort finally translates into helping the elephants in our forests.”
Top row and ext r: Arzan Khambatta’s "playful pachyderms;" 2nd row: Adil Writer’s "Little Trumpets"
Writer, who has three ceramic soda-fired platters at the show, calls his works "My Little Trumpets.” These are mounted on the backing of burnt, charred wood, "which in a way reflects the texture of elephant skin and the sad decline in the number of Asian elephants,” he told us on August 18. Also on show are his ceramic "Elephant Stamps” which have multiplied the elephant motif several times in a painting. "If only it were as easy as making stamps to multiply our vanishing Asian elephants,” he commented.
Bharucha told Parsiana that his five miniature sculptures, one on chalk and four on lead are displayed in glass capsules along with a magnifying glass "so the viewers can have a look at the minute intricate workmanship of the handiwork.” Gallerist Dr Tarana Khubchandani had "immediately approved the pieces, and mentioned that they would add a different dimension to the collection,” the miniaturist stated.
Rishabh Shroff, partner at legal firm Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas and philanthropy ambassador of WWF India was quoted in the Gallery’s press note as stating: "Speak to your children about elephants and pique their interest with fun facts. Make your succession plan with either a lifetime gift or legacy donation to this cause.” The Gallery’s write-up states that "the public does not seem fully aware of the dire situation for Asian elephants, the world’s rarest elephant species… Sometimes, art needs to partner with science revealing the wonders of our world.”
World Elephant Day was co-founded on August 12, 2012 by Canadian Patricia Sims and the Elephant Reintroduction Foundation of Thailand, an initiative of Queen Sirikit of Thailand. Partnered with 100 elephant conservation organizations, their website states that "World Elephant Day is the vehicle by which organizations and individuals can rally together to give voice to the issues threatening elephants.”