Born in India, Milburn Cherian did not train to be an artist, graduating in visual communication from the National Institute of Design in 1983. Yet she has among her portfolio, a painting like ‘The Healing,’ which sparked mass hysteria among people when it made its maiden public appearance during the exposition of Francis Xaviers’s relics at Goa in 2004.
That painting, among her best known works, has 280 figures and took months to complete. Reminiscing, she says that she worked on that canvas after artists were told by the Diocese of Goa to base their paintings on a passage from the Bible. Milburn chose The Healing. These paintings were then put up in an exhibition, ‘Bridging the gap through the Gospel,’ coinciding with the exposition of the sacred relics of Saint Francis Xavier at Bishops Palace in Old Goa.
“There were so many finger prints on the canvas as people just wanted to touch the picture once... to me it is a blessed work,” she says. This is also a painting which she holds close to her chest and one that she does not like to sell. The starting price of her paintings is Rs 3.5 lakhs. The average size is around 14x12 inches, while some, for instance, Tsunami, Sienna Earth and The Healing, spread out to 61 inches. Milburn has also donated her paintings to charities and to organisations such as Parkinson’s Disease Foundation, Cancer Patients Society, Khushii, SOS Villages in India and Save the Children Foundation.
Heading for Delhi
Cherian is now in Kolkata to showcase this artwork along some others in her maiden exhibition in the city. The show goes to Delhi early next year. She has held solo exhibitions in Mumbai and in London and participated in group exhibitions all over India as well as New York, the U.S., Japan, UAE and Russia. In Mumbai her work was exhibited at the Jehangir Art Gallery, Cymroza, The Fine Art Gallery and Pradarshak Art Gallery. In London, it was at Mayfair. Her work has also travelled to Pakistan where she participated in a group exhibition, ‘Bridging Borders.’
The 1957-born Milburn shied away from making a livelihood as a graphic artist as she felt that graphic designing teaches you to simplify things — to translate an idea easily. “My thinking ran contrary to this, I realised later. I like doing just the opposite. I like detailing,” she says. That detailing is vivid in each one of her acrylic on canvas artworks. Expressive faces, minute work on the dresses of her myriad figures, the designs on the floor tiles, the scene-depictions (Jesus Heals the Lepers) all show her love for detailing. Special mention may be made of the work Mother Most Pure. The faces however are all Occidental.
“I am not a born artist... nor do I have any formal training,” confesses Milburn. “I am self-taught but my Guru is Pieter Bruegel. My sister once brought one of his paintings and from that moment, I knew that I had found my master,” she elaborates.
Pieter Bruegel believed to have been born around 1525 was a Netherland Renaissance painter, according to his website.
In the initial years, Milburn was shy to make public her paintings. Gradually, she developed the confidence to come out into the open. “Now it comes to me naturally.. I am so glad I did not give up,” she says. And the fact that she did struggle to find her confidence level is evident in her initial paintings, which are predominantly sepia. “I was scared of colours... I was not sure how to use them without overwhelming or underwhelming the work... now I am more confident,” she says.
Deep scar
So one associates colours with happiness, sorrow and sequences like dances, dreams... The sepia tone may also be linked to the tragedies that struck her early in life. “The loss of my parents, one after the other when I was still a teenager, left a deep scar as did the tsunami of 2005. My work was saved but we lost a lot in that calamity,” her voice trails off...
Biblical themes dominate Milburn’s work and she is not shy of admitting to her religiosity. Thus one sees paintings like the Feast of the Righteous or The Healing. But her repertoire is not all sombre stuff. There are also depictions of clowns in her paintings to show happiness and a relaxed attitude.
