A conflict has arisen in the Indian art scene after contemporary artist Anita Dube was accused of copyright infringement by poet Aamir Aziz. Dube's recent exhibition included works that featured lines from Aziz's poem, created during anti-CAA protests, without his consent. Aziz criticized Dube's actions as egregious theft that contradicts the poem's message of resistance, stating that it commodifies his protest. Dube defended her actions by claiming she intended to honor Aziz's work, likening her approach to citing other influential figures and stressing her admiration for his poem.
This is my poem, written in velvet cloth, another carved in wood, hung inside a commercial white cube space, renamed, rebranded, and resold at an enormous price without ever telling me... This is not conceptual borrowing. This is theft.
The poem raged against injustice. Anita Dube turned it into a luxury commodity.
I have been in love with Sab Yaad Rakha Jayega, especially some lines which swirled around in my head like dervishes.
I quoted Aamir Aziz's poem to celebrate them; I have quoted Martin Luther King and bell hooks, and others in the same spirit.
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