Artists were Never Meant to be Content Creators

I write this as I start my content creation journey on the Instagram handle @odissiandbeyond , inspired by two of my closest friends, Siddhi Satpathy and Sidhi Pattnaik.

https://www.instagram.com/odissiandbeyond/

Art was never meant to be content.

Why's that? That's because art was never meant to be commodified. History says otherwise over and over, again and again. But you'll always hear us artistes repeating these words; words against the capitalisation and commercialisation of art.

But first, let's ponder: what is art?

According to me, art is that which an artist brings into existence, from thin air, from their imagination.

Now, my problem is with the people who reduce art to strategic content planning, trending audio selection and hook optimisation. I see Instagram forcibly push content which are laden with controversy rather than contemplation; I see the algorithm favour reels over posts; I see people leaning towards trends over originality. I despise that. All of it. I hate artists having to resort to all these means just to showcase their art. I hate seeing artists reduce themselves and their art into some sort of algorithmic fodder.

"I think we artists never noticed how art suddenly became all about views, likes, trends and followers when it should have been about soul and self expression" said one comment on Instagram on a post that provoked me to write this article.

The rich context that art provides to the society and to the self, by its ability to challenge, provoke, and transform, has been reduced to mere numbers like metrics and engagement rates. The result of all this is the homogenisation of art. When every artist runs behind what is already working, we keep moving towards the same thing and you guessed it right: it is dangerous for art.

But then, I have a contradicting thought as I type this out article: my heart swells with gratitude for the incredible team that surrounds me in this journey of @odissiandbeyond namely, Siddhi Satpathy, Anant Sethy, Sidhi Pattnaik, and Rohan Kar. Writing the previous section felt necessary for a cathartic release of frustrations that many artists, including me, carry in this digital age. But then, my introspection is incomplete. I can go so far as to call it "half-hearted", "elitist", and "forced".

Why is that?

These guys have helped me retain my much treasured artistic innocence: and I can even go on to say that, it has also fuelled my artistic side. These people are like a protective cocoon around my creative spirit by moulding things to go my way, and at times even encouraging me to do things that are outside my comfort zone. That is what fuels an artist. Isn't it?

My blog, I think would be filled with writings about "intent" by now (I think). Since I am writing in a flow now, I don't want to go and check (what this actually means is that there might be posts which I think I have posted, but are rotting away in the drafts). Coming back to our topic: I intend to "create" for a certain purpose, not for virality or popularity. And the absence of such ambitions on an app that fuels them, is a by-product of my team's guidance. They have never in this entire course of action, ever guided me to run after these things.

I will be very open now. Even I was opposed to content creation in the beginning. Maybe because I had that ego and air of superiority in me about being an "artist" or maybe because it was an untreaded path for me and I knew nothing about it [or maybe a bit of both]. This article, hence must have started off with an air of elitism. However, I see myself changing through this article. This transformation feels sacred, and I think, we are allowed to change as people (as opposed to what we show to the world). I discovered that my views are malleable but my principles, not at all.

My earlier critique missed out on a crucial fundamental truth. Social media has become one of the most democratising forces in human history. For artists, it has eliminated gatekeepers (in a way). For me, it has given a way for me to put out content that preserves and promotes our literature and music.

Artists are gatekeeping. I don't really know why these things happen, but they are happening. There's this strange phenomenon I keep noticing, and I'm not entirely sure how to make sense of it, but it feels important to write about it anyway. There seems to be a tendency among practitioners to use increasingly complex Odia vocabulary in everyday conversation about the art form. I don't know if it is just something that naturally evolved, but the effect is undeniable: it alienates a lot of people who might otherwise be drawn to this beautiful tradition. In this, maybe the speaker gains recognition as a learned person, but what exactly is the audience taking away? Do they absorb the what is being shared, or do they simply walk away impressed by the speaker's erudition while remaining disconnected from the art itself? I genuinely don't know the answer, but the question troubles me.

Here's where I need to be honest and it feels necessary because otherwise I might sound hypocritical. I myself am not a very good orator. Whether I speak in English or Odia, I make countless mistakes when speaking publicly. My thoughts often scatter, and I stumble over words in ways that make me cringe internally. But in creating the @odissiandbeyond account, I've made a subconscious choice to use English. Not because it is simple or because I think my audience lacks intelligence. I use it because I believe that Odissi shouldn't be locked behind linguistic barriers. I'm trying to create space for a new audience: people who are genuinely interested but have been excluded because they don't possess the specialised vocabulary that has somehow become prerequisite in public speaking.

And then there is another thing. From what I've observed time and again, many performers who regularly present Odissi don't seem to know meanings of what they're performing. This creates the strangest situation: artists executing technically perfect gamaks while being disconnected from the soul of what they're expressing. It's as if the physical and intellectual understanding have been separated, creating performers who are technically proficient but culturally adrift. What emerges from all this is a peculiar form of cultural inaccessibility that nobody seems to have planned but everybody seems to perpetuate. Odissi is becoming simultaneously over-intellectualised in its presentation and under-understood in its practice.

The tragedy is that none of this seems malicious. People aren't deliberately trying to exclude others or create barriers. They're often just sharing their knowledge using the vocabulary they've acquired through their own learning. Meanwhile, devotees stand outside, genuinely interested but unable to access the essence for they haven't learned the secret language. And the performers inside the fortress sometimes aren't fully connected to what they're protecting either.

I don't have answers to why this is happening or how to fix it systematically. What I do know is that my own small attempt through @odissiandbeyond feels like swimming against a strange current I don't fully understand. Maybe I'm wrong about all of this. Maybe the complexity serves purposes I can't see. Maybe the linguistic barriers protect something essential that would be lost through accessibility. I genuinely don't know. But I know what I'm witnessing feels like a disconnect between intention and impact. This whole situation bewilders me, but perhaps bewilderment is the first step toward understanding. Or maybe that's just what I tell myself to make sense of something that doesn't quite make sense at all.

As I finish writing this article, I find a certain clarity in my thoughts. As opposed to my previous stance, I don't see it as a contradiction, but as an expansion on it. Both truths co-exist: there is the danger of algorithmic pressure building on me, while there are innumerable incredible opportunities. In this, I have faith on my team that they won't let me fall victim to the dangers at any given time.

All the art that we create, ultimately becomes content for somebody else. Art has no boundaries or limits. Content creation, when done with integrity, becomes a vehicle for artistic expression, not a hinderance. I find myself becoming a huge fan of this interconnected creative system.

Me in front of an old building in Puri.