Viewing paintings and sculptures at the Art Indus Gallery in the Santushti Complex in New Delhi makes one realise that an audience is unconsciously aware of the profound aesthetics expressed in paintings as well as sculptures. The achievements by Ram Kumar Manna of Kolkata in contemporary terracotta Ganeshas are the integration of shlokas, conceptions and traditional concepts in his hand-moulded works.
Through this image of a Ganesha the development of the philosophy of mythical legends and rituals reflects the truth that the arts are a paralleled progression, where philosophers, poets and painters strive to discover perfect harmony and wisdom between these three fields.
And if that were not enough, it is the paintings by Satish Chauhan that invite the lyrics of great stories, like Shakuntala and, of course, Kamayani. An excellent poem must be equipped with six major basic elements: allignment, rhyme, trope, style, feelings and conceptions. Rhyme dictates that beautiful poetry must offer readers/listeners with the smooth and spiritual feelings; allignment determines sustained balance; expression of feeling and conceptions express the spirituality behind the poem. One must discover the character and mood of the poet, experience his aesthetics and, in turn, transform that fleeting moment into eternity. With this concept in mind, we review the paintings by Satish Chauhan and find strong correspondence to it in terms of his luscious maidens.
In traditional miniature painting, lines not only outline objects, but depict the unique concept of richness in painting. In the poems, smooth and balanced beauty emphasise the alignment, while rhyme appropriately explain the close connections between linear structures in Satish’s paintings and literature. In Satish’s eyes, the three-dimensionality purported by the West and Oriental aesthetics become close creative elements; with simple lines, and wispy colours, he separates flat narrative space from traditional miniature paintings into light and dark regions, applying thick tones to import literal conceptions, leading us towards a territory where coexistence of rhythm, colour, light and shade culminate.
Love is one of Rana’s still-life bronze works, showing clear differences in style when compared with other sculptors of the same genre. By analysing three similar sculptures in structural composition to contour application, Love adopts subtle tones to the point of dark silvery, which, to Rana, represents the infinite profound space on the image and the profound and elegant imaginary world, containing not only the silence and quietness, but also the mystery and grace that the contours achieve respectively.
In the structuring of the second work To The Village, Rana deliberately preserves the unique pedestal separation that his works always contain, enabling the images to have their own sense of strong spirituality and the abstract ideas brought about by the tone of bronze. If we analyse this quaint summer show, through tones and lines, the artists convey sculptural and painting styles with the coexistence of material and abstract conceptions with skillful and deliberate application of technique.