Paintings to fight society's ills

The ambience is serene though the surrounding is serious. It is the campus of Bharath Hospital and Institute of Oncology. But the ten young artistes from different parts of the country were all thoroughly enjoying themselves painting on the common theme, ‘Is urbanization getting crazy?’ After all they were doing it for common cause--raising money for cancer patients.

“It is a wonderful feeling for the artistes to come together, share ideas, paint and freely give away their creations for a cause,” said art consultant Franck Barthelemy who is curating the show that is organised by HCG Foundation.

“We hope to raise Rs 20 lakh by auctioning these art pieces at a fund raising show to be held in Bangalore on December 10. Our target is to reach at least Rs 55 lakh till March next year to support the cause of caner patients,” said HCG Foundation director Anjali Ajaikumar.

The ten artistes who have come together are Sumana Chowdhury from Bangalore, Umesh from Hyderabad, Barun Chowdhury from Baroda, Mukesh Sharma from Delhi, Birendra Pani also from Delhi, Benitha Perciyal from Chennai, Sumoj D from Bangalore, Suchender P from Mysore, Mantu Das from Shantiniketan and the lady behind the show Bhagya Ajaikumar.

The paintings had variety. While a few were abstract, the others were vibrant, colourful and something that one could relate to.

Benitha Perciyal said that she had not thought about what to paint as “I cannot plan and work.” She had picked up flying seeds and bark powder, the natural elements to use in her painting. Sumana Chowdhury who has held solo exhibitions said that her forte was mapping and she had mapped New York city and the other was about brain cell mapping which is a very good exercise and the colours she used were gold and silver.

“I want transparency in our social life. You should be answerable for everything. We don’t need multiple malls. It is all about selling and buying. There is no end to greed,” she said.
“There is an archetypal universe. Art creativity is not from rational faculty or psyche; it is often from irrational faculty. Everything is a primitive landscape and there is the Mother tree. All these works are like myths created by individuals, a dream of collective psyche,” said Umesh.

The monkey trying to grab the beautiful, cushioned chair represents extreme fundamentalism. The political advantage that people try to get can create anything like a Godhra or Mumbai riots.

It is the common man who is caught in-between and suffering, said Barun Chowdhury. Andpointing to another drawing which showed a giraffe losing stripes, he said it was where we eat and digest everything. There is no escape from it, he adds.

“The superwoman of today’s world is going to launch so many things. It is contemporary; it is also spiritual in urban surroundings. Thought it looks hotch potch it is very connected,” said Mukesh Sharma pointing to the strikingly colourful modern painting of the ‘superwoman’ with many other dimensions. Influenced by the surrealist Spanish painter Salvador Dali, Birendra Pani’s ‘Game of time’ sets one thinking even as one looks at the melting watch hanging on the shoulder of a human body which also highlights metro.

The abstract painting which Bhagya Ajaikumar, who teaches PG students in CAVA, was doing was just taking shape. “The urbanization theme comes from intuition and the abstract paintings are something that each one interprets according to his, her understanding,” she said.

“I have always dealt with these issues of urbanization, loss of farm land and in the urban Indian context, it is a weekend getaway,” said Sumoj displaying his other work ‘Thousand sun rises in the farm land.’

The JCBs which have occupied the urban landscape is very telling depicted by Suchender who shows an elephant with its trunk working like a JCB and with high rise building in the background with the G-20 flags flying.

The youngest painter Mantu Das who is full of ideas uses traditional Assamese proverbs and fables to show where we as a nation are heading.
Art shows like these for a cause is the way forward to fight many a battle.