Exhibition Barnali Nandy showed her creations at Anant Art Gallery this past week.
If some young artists today are taking art seriously and bringing the likes of Ghalib and Godhra on their canvas, others are also incorporating humour in their works. In some, this humour is subtle; in others it is obvious.
For instance, sometime ago, a young Manjunath Kamath’s works at Art Konsult included a fat black mouse trying to enter a stark red couch pillow. What made it hilarious was the analogous shapes of the mouse’s body and the couch pillow. As the mouse enters the bolster, its tail is left sticking out, and at the other end, the string of the bolster completes the picture, prompting a smile.
Similarly, Barnali Nandy’s exhibition Dyed Images, recently concluded at Anant Art Gallery, is another example of fun elements included in art. Barnali chooses eatables such as chillies, garlic, onion and objects of daily use such as a comb, a pair of glasses, etc., to convey fun and thoughts we often ignore as unimportant. As interesting is her mixed media (batik on chikankari cloth and watercolour on handmade paper board). She employs chillies in three different stages: young, middle age and old in “A pair of young/old mirchi”. Her young mirchi is hot red, middle age is a mix of white and red and the old one is a wilted yellow and earth. “I have used chillies to convey the fabric of life in different ages,” she reasons. In her other images a pair of glasses, comb and other such utility objects are placed on a puffed pillow. “Comb in Bengali also roughly indicates falling harshly on the head, while a pillow is meant for comfort. I have tried to put two opposites together,” says Barnali.
Barnali’s other works include interesting batik scrolls painted with luminous colours. She carves human images, chillies and butterflies to ornament the cloth. At times her images and batik work look amateur, but they are creative nonetheless. Her treatment gives them a transparent quality, and they can be used as hangings also. This is for the first time that a traditional batik technique is put to such artistic use. Barnali has been working on fabrics for five years.
RANA SIDDIQUI
Printer friendly
page Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
