Brushing the Bruises

“One who does not understand the anatomy of a woman, is far far behind those who do,” opines Assamese painter and poet Partha Sarthi Dutta. Most of his paintings in an art exhibition in All India Fine Arts and Crafts society (AIFACS) overtly express his deep understanding of a woman, and his concerns about their omnipresent suppression. “A woman is multifaceted. With them, what one sees is not what is necessarily true. It is the depth of their psyche and emotions that appeal to me.”

The three prominent dimensions of the exhibited paintings are agony of womenfolk, political criticism, and landscapes. “A woman is the giver of life. Her importance, though inextricable in our lives, is scarcely acknowledged.” In some of his paintings, he goes on to compare women with fishes and balloons, signifying the continuity in life.

The paintings depicting political criticism unambiguously arise out of his disillusionment in war and bloodshed essentially taking place in Assam, also portraying his appurtenance with his soil. The material he uses for his collages are headlines from Assamese and Bengali newspapers, burnt jute, and bandage, and are reminiscent of the repeated terrorist attacks in the country and the government’s failure in curbing them, which have left irredeemable sorrow in his heart. Although his paintings are a surreal portrayal of hard realism, he maintains that he is not a pessimist. “The critics like to disagree, but realism is not always pessimistic. I am still hopeful that someday, things would change.”

Dutta’s paintings predominantly include shades of blue, green and yellow, nostalgic of Assam. “In Assam, one finds these colours everywhere. The clear blue of the sky. The greenery giving an essence of tranquillity. The greenery which has been brutally shattered amidst the violent streak enormously emerging in the current arena.” Interestingly, most of his paintings which involve heave craftwork have been finished in one sitting taking approximately three hours.

Partha Sarthi is a government school teacher by profession. To him, poetry and art are a medium of expressing his innermost thoughts. He has been exhibiting his paintings since 1992, and has had five anthologies of his poems. He is not one of those who would violent retaliate to such abhorrent catastrophes. He’d rather keep silent, and allow his nibs and brushes do the talking

Carousing with Colours!

"Geometry in Colours" formed the theme for the paintings in an exhibition in progress at All India Fine Arts & Craft Society ( AIFACS ), from 1st to 7th July 2009. The artist has experimented purely with resplendent colours and shapes, and has brought out immaculate paintings through various permutations and combinations. An extrusive theme that runs through most of the paintings is conservation of nature, as the painter has subtly depicted the plight that the flora and fauna is facing owing to insensible rapid urbanisation.
The paintings are reflective of the predominantly alleviating, nature friendly and a refreshingly soothing essence embedded in the surroundings. He believes that the psychological state of the generation is sensitive, tenacious and self centered. "The youth today has lost the sensitivity that it once upheld.
However much the technology may aid the developments in diverse visual fields such as graphics, computer design, photography, video-graphy, camcorders or any other visual medium, the traditional use of canvas and paint will never fade or become unpopular with artists. "A painting can be, simply, an exploration of colour and form, an arrangement of paint on canvas, to evoke a feeling, a mood in the mind of the viewer, without seeking to represent them as real-life images" said B. Narayanan, expressing his views on art as an expression. He is an amateur artist, who has been teasing the canvas with myriad hues since the last seven years. He is an officer of the 1990 batch of the Indian Information Service, he is currently posted as Director (IEC) in the Ministry of Rural Development.
He remarks, "I paint to distress and take my mind off the busy schedule that I follow. Painting is the only thing that saves my soul from dying". Indulging in the world of abstraction and its accompanying freedom of interpretations, B. Narayanan claims to be deaf to symbolism . "there is nothing more than what you see in these pictures.I believe in the ideology of less is more" , having said so he has successfully managed to pull off this one with ease.
Like an old proverb goes ‘Good painting is like good cooking, it can be tasted not explained’, B. Narayanan’s nebulous concepts related to the prodigious piece work produced by him gave him contentment.

An Ode to the ostracised

Millions of hearts still croon over Rekha’s kindling expressions in “inn ankhon ki masti mein”, or Madhubala’s graceful movements in “mohe panghat pe nandlaal”. But that beautiful, scintillating dance form, which attracted the aristocrats, the Nawabs, and the Jahanpanahs of the Mughal kingdom to the evening mehfils of the courtesans, is now on the verge of extinction. Fortunately, there are a few like Manjari Chaturvedi, who are making ceaseless efforts to keep the typically Mughal dance form of Darbari Kathak alive.

Manjari Chaturvedi, a leading exponent of the Indian Classical dance form of Kathak, recently rendered some beautifully choreographed compositions in the Darbari Kathak style, in Kamani Auditorium. ‘Nazo: An Ode to the Courtesan’ was conceptualised, choreographed, and performed by her, as an effort to keep the dying art form alive. She was accompanied by some notable musicians on stage, which included Radhika Chopra, a highly appreciated Ghazal singer from Delhi, and Zareena Beghum, the last alive Court singer, from Bilhera in Awadh. Also accompanying her were Qawwal Noor ul Hasan and team from Awadh, and instrumentalists from Delhi and Lucknow. “The gayiki of Classical Kathak and Darbari Kathak is very different. Darbari gayiki is much lighter, as it was mainly to appease the courtiers. Accordingly, the dance steps are kept simpler, devoid of the complexities intrinsic to Hindustani Shastriya nritya,” says Zareena Beghum.

Having received training in Classical Kathak from the age of thirteen, Manjari has traveled across the globe and delivered innumerable concerts. She incorporated the dance styles of various countries of Central Asia in her own, and carved a new dance form called Sufi Kathak. “I traveled all over the ‘Sufi Belt’, which begins from Turkey, Persia and stretches to India – Pakistan, studying their folk dance froms. I interacted with various artists and tried to learn about those traditions which are not documented, but are passed on only through the word of mouth,” Manjari said. “Sufism is the worship of the formless God. Deriving from that, Sufi Kathak is devoid of the mudras and forms, like the form of Krishna, or the form of Rama, which are inextricable to Kathak.”

Apart from training new dancers in Sufi and Darbari Kathak, Manjari is delivering as many concerts as possible to popularize these drowning traditions. “All my efforts are directed towards evoking in my audiences an interest in our heritage.” And the efforts are admirable. While `our folk and classical cultures are receiving considerable appreciation, one hopes the likes of Manjari would succeed in rescuing the flame of courtly traditions from being extinguished forever.