Variety across the warp

In his tapestries, Bangalore-based artist S.G. Vasudev is perhaps more folk in approach than in his other works, says DEEPTI SHANKAR..

"Well, it is a fabric, no more nor less than a fabric is. But it is a coarse, vigorous, organic fabric; supple, certainly, but of a less yielding suppleness than silken or linen. It is heavy... heavy with matter and heavy with meaning. But it is more; it is heavy with intentions. It is this, which secures its magnificence to man and, therefore, to the building."

Jean Lucat, Le Travail dans la Tapisserie au Moyen Age, 1947 - reproduced from Tapestry, Barty Phillips, published by Phaidon Press Limited.

THERE is more to Bangalore based artist S. G. Vasudev than meets the eye. He is gentle, open and warm, and it reflects in his art. He has a way of making the viewer intrigued by his extraordinary imaginative depth. There is a certain subtlety in his tones, a vibrancy in his colours, through which he evocatively expresses gaiety and pain. His lively lines reveal his articulation in thought. His vision is poetic and the mode he chooses is touchingly lyrical.

He has the power of personal persuasion to inspire and construct. His receptivity to creative ideas seems to have no limits. He has been art director for cinema as well as theatre, and his love for literature, poetry and music has given him a strength in expression. His entry into tapestries is the result of one such endeavour.

In order to understand these woven works that Vasudev has painfully and meticulously worked on for over seven years, along with master weaver Subbarayulu, one has to appreciate how the two have carefully cultivated a working relationship which, over the years, has been mutually inspiring and complimentary. The works represent the culmination of the artist's vision and the craftsman's skill.

The tapestries are essentially painterly: the vision and language of a painter translated through weaving. The painted strokes make way for the thread and every layer and form unfolds into a woven work of art. They bring out a certain seductiveness and charm, adding reasonance and solidity to his otherwise more subtle explorations with the brush. The works are expressions of varied preoccupations and draw from the series of paintings and drawings he has done over many years, such as the "Vriksha (Tree of Life"), "He and She", "Humanscapes", "Earthscapes" and the more recent "Theatre of Life" series - whether it is centered on human beings, animals, nature or even the intermingling, and sometimes merging, of the three.

This is a new medium for Vasudev but it is not the first time he is venturing into a medium other than oils on canvas and ink on paper. Over the years he has experimented and worked extensively with copper relief and executed murals using different media.

Perhaps his days in the Cholamandal Artists' Village, Chennai, are responsible for his craving for communion at work. K.C.S. Panicker, an artist and teacher for whom Vasudev has great respect, encouraged him and his peers to transverse the boundaries between art and craft. As a student and young artist, he worked with batik, terracotta and other craft forms to sustain himself, as did other students and young artists at Cholamandal. The bond that comes naturally as the result of living with fellow artists and building an artists' village, enduring hardships while encouraging and supporting each other, has also made him value human relationships as well as nature. Both of these concerns radiate in his works. Perhaps this is why he has happily, and excitedly, collaborated with an artisan to bring forth the observer and the observed in him into a new mould by merging skill and vision into a universal, undivided form of art.

In his tapestries, Vasudev is perhaps more folk in approach than in his other works. He uses a simplistic language that is both profound and enigmatic in expression. He transforms the ordinary into the theatrical like a dramatised allegory. He accentuates and celebrates them through colours that are exaggerated in comparison to those in his paintings. The contortion of form is charmingly highlighted, the lines are bolder, and he creates deeper and richer hues that are at once warm and brilliantly expressive.

Revealing the barest minimum, he soothingly removes colours, making it largely monochromatic with sudden bursts of vibrancy that create a synergy of intensity. He skillfully creates alchemy between texture and his own inward mysticism.

The inspiration drawn from Tanjore glass paintings is telling in terms of treatment. It is solid and at times even effectively harsh. It surprises the viewer through a ruptured treatment of surface that is almost graphic in approach but never ceases to flow in lyricism.

Vasudev's exuberance is invested quite profoundly in a medium that translates his primary concerns - the interplay of fantasy and reality, the relation between human being and nature. Through this he forges a communion of the artist and the craftsman. By imparting his vision and fusing it with traditional knowledge, or Gnana, of the craftsman, he extends art to craft. As he says, "It is possible for an artist to work in varied media and adapt to the different approach and treatment required for each. I always explore possibilities that challenge my creative abilities."

His paintings always have a woven feel to them. They intertwine between content and form, between inner vision and receptiveness to the outer world. Now his tapestries in turn paint the same interconnectedness in a different texture.

The writer, an art critic, has previously worked in a gallery and taught art history at the Chitrakala Parishath, Bangalore.

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