Priyanka Banerjee, a Delhi-based artist, has created a series of eight artworks putting the deer at the centre of her work, exploring subtle themes of its powerful antlers, athletic legs, and its friendly though timid disposition. Done in watercolours, acrylic on canvas, pen and pencil on paper – she was limited by what she had at home -- she looked at photographs taken in Gir National Park and Ranthambore, for inspiration.
Priyanka Banerjee
This Paschim Vihar resident, who has had 12 solo and 20 group shows in Delhi, Jaipur and Agra, isn’t formally trained in art. She did an arts appreciation course at the National Museum Institute, Janpath, about seven years ago, leading her into art writing.
Deer, she says, first found artistic representation in palaeolithic cave paintings. For her though, there is a connect that goes deeper. “Like American Emily Dickinson’s poem ‘A wounded deer leaps highest’, I too admire the spirit of this creature,” says Banerjee.
She feels deer mostly remain in the solitude of the wild and in the context of the current coronavirus lockdown situation, are symbolic of our existence today. “We are living in uncertain times. The sudden change from a fast-paced life to a quarantined existence can be stressful. Just like the jungles where there exists an absolute calm, cities today have become isolated. In late March a nilgai was seen on a stretch of road in Noida.
The antelope walked about freely till it was spotted by cops. A few decades ago, these antelopes were natural inhabitants of the land,” she says.
She herself tries to destress by getting away to the forest, where “the greenery, the gurgling streams, the chirping of birds and crickets, fills my heart with delight.”
Through these paintings, she hopes to try to highlight the deer’s role in ecological balance. “Despite several laws, many indulge in royal sports or poach their antlers for exorbitant prices. Some deer species like the black buck have been pushed to the verge of extinction and are counted as endangered species,” she says, hoping that the lockdown will help us reconnect with Nature.
View her work on Instagram @priya_ban2003
