FLUID FIGURES

JOGEN CHOWDHURY is back at the India Art Fair with the power of pastels and paper — the oldest tools in the world, says UMA NAIR

Artist Jogen Chowdhury will be in Delhi for the India Art Fair as part a solo showing at the prestigious gallery Sanchit Art. Chowdhury doesn't need an introduction. In terms of the blue chip power of works from the Bengal School, nobody can hold a candle to him. The mellifluous lines and cross-hatching of textural details in the natural human form is his legacy.

RESTLESS URGE: Chowdhury has always had clear thoughts about the power and passion of what art should be to its practitioners. “All art that is truly born from within, is born out of a restless urge that springs from a state of disturbances, distances and surprises that we perceive in life’s many journeys,” says he.

The artist has travelled his own path — he chose folklore aspects of Indian culture as his primary inspiration. In works that are fascinating figuratives, we have images that are characterised by elongated, amoeboid figures, drawing from the natural as well as psychological. Over the years, Chowdhury has effortlessly woven together a distinctive contemporary milieu with elements of traditional imagery, and an interplay of felicity and fragility.

In 2007, when I sat in his studio at Shantiniketan to talk to him about his solo show Abahoman at the Vadehra Art Gallery in Delhi, he spoke at length about drawing and simply stated: “A drawing is about being able to cultivate the body and spirit... it is not only about a pretty picture. Working with the basic nature of a person is very much a characteristic of my work; I draw upon natural elements of people’s faces for inspiration.”

DRAMA AND DYNAMISM: Chowdhury's greatest collector has been fish baron Masanari Fukuoka who has virtually picked up his best works over two decades from exhibitions as well as the auctions. The most vital component for Chowdhury is his interpretation of the function of lines. His contours, meandering and coalescing, lend an aura of drama and dynamism to his works.

In Man Seated on the Floor and Face of a Girl, he portrays two separate figures, using powerful, fluid lines and the pastel shades of cross-hatching with an accuracy and depth so characteristic of his style. The undulating contours of the figurative bodies as well as the profile of the faces he creates render a sense of rhythmic movement that is rare, if not animated.

Man Lying on a Khat is a rustic translation of the simplicity of a scene — here the man sits centrally, portrayed with an attractive yet tender vulnerability. However, the piece de resistance of the solo offering is an Untitled 2014 pastel on paper of a bare-bosomed female figure holding a skull that looks surreal because of its threaded facade — almost held as a trophy as she contemplates. The threaded textural terrain of the skull matches the vastra she wears as well as her hair pulled back into a bun.

RUSTIC RADIANCE: Chowdhury revels in creating images that are not beautiful — they are not painterly, like the Woman with Silver Necklace (2011), but his women have a rustic radiance and enigmatic elegance in the way he succinctly captures a transient moment of vulnerability with an accurate yet lyrical clarity that stems from his highly developed technique and deep understanding of his subject and the human condition.

In an interview in 2005 before his show in Japan at the Glenbarra Art Museum, he had said, “What I felt quite strongly about was the need to create something new and original, something which could not be accomplished either by replication of Western art or by falling back on Indian art. In other words, on ancient India and its heritage alone... The other idea that struck me was that it was my own characteristics that would define and determine my art and its conventions. My memories, dreams, thoughts, environment — they could all become subjects of my works.”

STUNNING PASTELS: In this small but epic solo show at Sanchit Art, lovers can partake of the sinuous fluid line and simplification of forms that have their foundation from his appreciation of the Bengal pat tradition. It’s also a lesson for younger and emerging artists — the power of pastels and paper — the oldest tools in the world. This is why he said, “The sheer range of characters, temperaments and manners that I observed in the people that I saw around myself fascinated me. I portrayed them from an essentially personal perspective. In my characterisation of these people, I crossed the boundaries of realistic representation and let imagination take over.”

When Chowdhury creates stunning pastel works on paper, there are no backgrounds. With effortless ease, his figures are woven into a shape with a spidery web of dense cross-hatched lines, fleshed out with a hint of colour added with a soft dry pastel as in Politicians. “We did not have electricity in our house and I had to read by the hurricane lantern. I had to fall back on black and white because we did not have enough light... We had a miserable state of living when we came to Kolkata as refugees... the criss-crossing lines, too, may be carrying traces of the environmental and mental complications of that time,” he reminisced about humble beginnings.

This show reflects not just his sensitivity and his idea of composition and context but it positions his originality and deep sense of observation from the social and cultural milieu around him.

Sanchit Art will soon be publishing Of Rain and Shine — Life and Art of Jogen Chowdhury written by art critic Arun Ghose. Till then feast your eyes on this master.