|
Contemporary
Indian art is as exciting and unpredictable as modern-day India
itself. Colorful, brash and in-your-face as the open air bazaars
spilling with multicolored wares, it blends the hi-tech immediacy
of millions of computer chips and televisions with the age-old
divinity of the myriad gods of the Hindu pantheon. The spirit
of the land permeates modern Indian art, whether the artist
is deeply rooted in the homeland or has left for foreign shores.
The noted
artist Mohan Samant has been living and working in New York
for the past thirty-nine years, yet India is never far from
his mind. Born in Bombay, he was part of the Progressive Artists
Group, which included M.F. Husain and F.N. Souza. He worked
in Italy and England before coming to New York on a John D.
Rockefeller grant. Over the years he has exhibited at several
noted museums and galleries including the Smithsonian and the
Museum of Modern Art in Oxford. His works are in several collections
including the Asia Society, The Museum of Modern Art in New
York and Colgate University in New York.
Living
in a vibrant city like New York, many other influences have
seeped into his work. One of his most vital resources is the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the many cultures represented
there find their way into his work by osmosis. In his provocative
oils and watercolors, he juxtaposes wire figures with ancient
Mayan, African and Egyptian influences in a blaze of color reminiscent
of Indian miniatures to create a contemporary synthesis of images.
A magician
with the paintbrush, Samant excels in sleight of hand: his wire
figures float in the air, part of the landscape and yet not
part of it, ephemeral as ghosts. As Barbara Bertieri of A Gallery
notes, “We do not need to see their flesh or their resemblance
to real humans in order to perceive their human essence and
to understand that they are people, that they are us.”
This three-dimensional
element is apparent even in his complex watercolors, which have
encrusted patinas. Says Bertieri: “Layers of colors, nuances,
and shapes give us the impression that, while we are looking
at a first figure, we see a second image behind it and perceive
a third presence beyond them.”
Samant
adds dime store plastic toys and dolls' eyeballs to his works,
using them like celestial relief figures in ancient Indian sculpture.
He points out, “Art is after all a reflection of the societies
we live in. Remember how Picasso turned a bicycle seat and handlebars
into a work of art?”
Though
he lives in New York, India continues to be an important influence,
right from the brilliant colors to the Hindu mythology that
permeates his works. He says, “A lot of our gods and goddesses
have four arms, three heads and whatnot - and this is absolutely
modern. Modern art was never new to us - we were just bombarded
with very mediocre realist painting under the British for 200
years.”
|