Untitled (1977) Waterproof coloured ink and coloured pencil on handmade paper by Amitava on display at KNMA gallery Delhi
| Photo Credit: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

The artworks of artists from two different generations, Amitava and Mohan Samant, on display at the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art (KNMA) in Saket, spin a similar narrative that stirs the human conscience.

If We Knew The Point by Amitava, and Magic in The Square by Mohan Samant engage the audience with their respective pictorial constructivism that hints at the mysterious and the unknown.

As one steps inside the gorge of the KNMA gallery, an obsidian room pays tribute to the colour black, as Amitava interprets it.. Against that sombre background, his self-illuminating canvases carry a mesmerising light that exudes tranquillity and serenity. Gazing at them, the mind feels at ease.

Amitava is significantly influenced by films and literature. He takes inspiration from Tagore, Kurosawa and Tarkovsky. On his canvases, a tube of paint takes different dimensions and acquires different shapes and meanings. The curatorial planning of Amitava’s artworks explains to the viewer how the artist addresses the human figure.

Amitava Untitled, 2021 Collage and tempera on palm leaf paper mounted on mount board displayed at KNMA gallery Delhi
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

His figuration in the artworks starts from dense overlapping lines and gradually gets fragmented as he pierces the figures and ruptures the forms. As a result, a hand extends to become a tree branch or a leg morphs into a mechanized body part. Through his compositions, he delineates the dehumanization of humanity.

He also embeds his canvases with ephemera materials like stamps, bus tickets, dry cleaning labels and everyday objects which he would hoard as memorabilia, using an assemblage technique. One can spot broken buttons, and remnants of threads, gauge, and evoke new meanings and associations.

Tanya Sharma, a Sociology student who came to see the exhibition, says, “The compelling aesthetic of Amitava’s works is very fascinating; it can be interpreted in more ways than one because the viewer is left to speculate.”

“I am not giving any particular directions for the work to be seen in a specific way. It should invoke something in everybody’s mind,” says the artist.

Experimental approach

Mohan Sawant’s 1996 painting Black Magician. Acrylic, oil, sand, straw and wire drawings on canvas displayed at KNMA Gallery in Delhi
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGMENT

Mohan Samant’s centennial exhibition, Magic in the Square, showcases his whimsical and quirky way of artmaking. Samant would not confine himself to just one medium and experiment with various media to evolve a new visual language.

He also had an affinity for Indian music and enjoyed the flute, dilruba and sarangi. Being a sarangi player, he added his creative insights and fortified his artistic vision. Initially, Samant was bound to conventional media: watercolours, graphite, pen and ink, and then slowly started to layer his surfaces with sand, dust and gravel. His work involves totemic figures, sedimented fossil-like structures, and engraved skeletal forms. His works involve cutting the canvases, creating cavities and filling them with figurative forms, creating illusions within the artistic grounds.

Samant’s artistry on display is about ancestors, human civilization and going back to the primordial Egyptian times. He incorporates depth and layers into his canvas by integrating 3-D cutouts and meandering wires. 

The attention he deserved eluded him and his artworks had been obscured for decades. Now, KNMA has brought 20 works of Samant from its collection to the fore.

Curator Roobina Karode is happy about the footfalls. “The exhibition has been attracting the youngsters to a crisp exploration of art practices that carry the dynamism of the spirit of the times the artists belonged to.”

Seona Saha

AT KNMA Saket till September 30 (closed on Monday and national holiday) from 10.30am to 6.30pm. Entry free.