Hyderabad, Jan 11: When
Arpana Caur came up with her first solo exhibition in 1975, the young artist
met with disappointing visitor attendance despite the venue being in her own
city of Delhi. With daily attendance seldom crossing one or two, some friends
made fun of the painter sitting all alone in the gallery: “So when are you next
having your one-person show?”
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| Renowned artist Arpana Caur speaks on 50 years of her work at a lecture on Jan 10 as part of the Krishnakriti Annual Festival of Art & Culture in Hyderabad. |
Three decades later and at
age 60, the highly accomplished artist was in Hyderabad to retrospect her
works, courtesy a lecture organised as part of the Krishnakriti Annual Festival
of Art and Culture. In her lecture here on ‘A Painter’s Journey (of 50 Years)’,
the globally-reputed Caur spoke about her artistic journey which began when she
was nine years old.
That was when the little
girl painted a work she titled ‘Mother’ — and candidly says it was on the lines
of legendary Amrita Sher-gil who died 13 years before Arpana was born in 1954.
As for the lukewarm
response she got to her debut solo in the national capital later as a
21-year-old, Caur virtually avenged it in 1981 by a exhibiting a successful
series called ‘The Missing Audience’ that featured a singer performing with
closed eyes to empty chairs. “I did manage to keep the flame burning,” she said
with a subtly stoic smile at the L V Prasad Eye Institute that hosted the art
talk on Saturday evening the five-day festival being organised the 2004-founded
Krishnakriti Foundation.
Then, in 1984, the
anti-Sikh riots in her city prompted Caur to paint after she witnessed the
ghastly lawlessness that killed more than 3,500 members — incidentally, of her
community. Thus happened another series, this time called ‘World Goes On’,
which was exhibited in 1986, capturing the horrors in the wake of the
assassination of then prime minister Indira Gandhi.
“I had never confronted
such violence,” recalled Caur, adding how she managed to guard the life of a
carpenter who was working with her when ordinary people went on the rampage.
The series fetched her the Triennale award in 1986.
A year thence, she
sketched gloomy images after an unexpected visit to Uttar Pradesh’s Vrindavan,
where she met the widows — many of them living on the streets, singing bhajans.
“Shrivelled and bald, their appearance disturbed me,” Caur said, pointing out
that the trip was originally meant as a visit to the museum in neighbouring
town of Mathura.
Her weekend lecture here
did have its share of hilarity as well when the artist recalled how one day in
1995 “Mr Arpana Caur” got an invitation for commissioned work in Hiroshima. The
address in wrong gender was indication of a biased cultural fraternity in
Japan, she was briefed by compatriot friends. Taking up the challenge “quietly”,
she surprised the art-lovers in the East Asian nation in more ways than one.
“It is still very sweet to remember of it,” added Caur about the large work she
completed at Hiroshima Museum of Modern Art for its permanent collection
for the 50th anniversary of the Holocaust.
Coincidentally for her, Arpana — her mother Ajeet Kaur is a
reputed writer — noted here that she had been customarily praying from
primary-school days for the victims of the atomic bombs exploded in the two
cities of Japan.
The lecture also saw Caur
surfing over her 1980 series ‘Dharti’, the meditative figures of spiritual
leaders such as Nanak, Kabir and the Buddha, her freedom-struggle heroes Bhagat
Singh, Udham Singh and Mahatma Gandhi, an abstract painting on Arjuna in
penance as seen in the sculptures of Mahabalipuram in Tamil Nadu and her 1995
work ‘City of Desires and Kalpavriksha’. The speaker also mentioned about her
employing traditional elements from Warli art and Madhubani paintings in works.
Caur’s hour-long session
was preceded by the screening of a film on veteran landscape painter Paramjit
Singh, who was present on the occasion to interact with the audience. The
70-minute movie ‘The Seventh Walk’, directed by the young and experimental Amit
Dutta, essays the Amritsar-born artist and his works known for their striking
use of light and colours in synthesis with his life in the scenic Kangra Valley
of Himachal Pradesh.
The
11th edition of the January 7-11 festival, conceived by Krishnakriti Foundation
head Prshant Lahoti, featured top-notch
dance, music, cinema and painting alongside talks, seminars and workshops.
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