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Mohan
B. Samant
Mohan B. Samant was born near Bombay in 1926. His early interest
in the arts was in classical Indian music. He began to paint
only upon his entry into the Sir J.J. School of Art in Bombay
in 1946. He received his diploma in 1951 and held his first
one man exhibition in the Jehangir Art Gallery, Bombay in 1952.
He was awarded a Silver Medal for his “Steps Unto the Pride
and Prestige” in the Annual Exhibition of the Bombay Art
Society, 1953-54.
“For me a work must first have a vitality of its own.
I do not mean a reflection of the vitality of life, of movement,
physical action, frisking, dancing figures... but that a work
can have in it a pent up energy, and intense life of its own,
independent of the object it represents.”
-
Henry Moore (The Sculptor's Aims)
As soon as Mohan B. Samant had received his Diploma in Painting
at the Sir J.J. School of Art in Bombay in 1951, he reacted
in two directions and began experiments in abstraction and in
copying. His oil “Abstract 1951” is rather in the
nature of a first solo flight, a little uncertain, but delighting
in being on his own. His copying experiments produced some ninety
imitation Jain and Rajput miniatures. These had the advantages
of giving him a confidence in handling the symbols and themes
of traditional Indian painting which was later to stand him
in good stead, not so much for themselves as for his own sureness
of touch in whatever he was to undertake. His “Still-Life”
of the same year combines his previous training with a balanced
inventiveness of colour, line and composition.
“Garden of Eden,” painted in 1952 suggests the influence
of Palsikar, whose “Sinners Divine” had made a great
impression on Samant several years previously. But the symbolism
is less definite, more personal. With a little imagination one
notices that some of the symbols bear a resemblance to musical
notation. This points to the very intimate relationship in Samant's
life of music and painting. It is his normal custom to practice
on his saringi - a kind of musical instrument equivalent to
the violin - for at least several hours each morning. He is
a disciplined worker, and follows this with painting. Sometimes
he plays again later in the day. He finds that music is a wonderful
tonic when he tires of painting.
By 1953, Samant had worked up to a very prolific period of experiment
in several new directions. His “Odalisque” shows an
influence of Rouault both in the heavy outline and in his use
of heavy, hot colours. But the mode of distortion of the figure
is his own. It develops in a way similar to that of a West African
sculpture. The African tribal artist does not begin from the
natural form of a human body but begins from a germinal concept
which grows into the finished work, developing, so to speak,
from the inside out and not from the outside in. This mode of
“distortion” is not properly conceived distortion
at all, in the sense in which it is normally understood - as
a deviation from a pre-existing natural form. The figure is
not a “distortion” of a figure, but an expression
of an idea. It is, in fact one step beyond abstraction. And,
in India, this can be further understood in much the same terms
that decoration and symbolism can be understood. Distortion
and reality are not automatic antitheses, each with a life of
its own, but varying reflections of the unity which underlines
all difference.
The “Chariot” bears a formal resemblance to the “Still-Life”
of two years before, but is less dependent upon the nature of
day-by-day reality. It is painted over an earlier painting,
some parts of which are integrated into the new. Its composition
is static but “alive”. The pulsing red and orange
colour is like a cup of coffee and a hot bath - one is both
awakened and relaxed.
“Fisherwoman” is more rectangular in its distortion
than “Odalisque.” It is painted in transparent water-colour
direct from the tube, used as oil rather than as wash or on
a dampened ground. Its colour is as compelling as that of “chariot.”
And it is more inventive than either. To be “inventive”
is not just to paint what one knows as opposed to what one sees,
but to paint what one is capable of invention, of imagining,
beyond what one knows conceptually. It is the germ of true creativity.
“A Woman in Water Colour” goes further in the distortion
and break-up ....
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