Aami Atmaja, one of the participating artists from the group show ‘Ordinary Historians and Wayward Daughters’, on at BC Gallery, Bazaar Road, Mattancherry, says, “I am looking for viewers’ responses.” She believes that the viewer has a duty and that the artist needs the viewer’s help. To get that she has introduced text in her works.
Text catches the eye, holds the viewer and leaves an imprint. Many a time it evokes a response. Aami’s two works, oil on canvas, ‘Beautiful Moms and Ugly Daughters’ and ‘Pictorial’ are large works with the storyline condensed to dedicated spaces on the canvas. The work is intricate and mysterious; the viewer led into a conundrum. “It is a search and research,” says Aami.
The BC Collective (Backyard Civilisation), born a few years ago, is a collective of artistes from different fields. The collective has held poetry performances, street art shows and staged other fresh forays into presentation of art. This is their first formal art show.
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Sosa Joseph’s ‘Prayer’ is a direct narration of a hallowed time of worship. Its soft and gentle hues and cloistered figures carry a sense of tranquillity that comes with prayer. Pradeep Kumar K.P.’s work of soft pastel on paper depicts a colony of bats in flight.
Shanto Antony’s series ‘Fool’s Garden’ in mixed media are works in different sizes and that is interesting. The storyline with animal and nature imagery is open. Gipin Varghese’s two works in watercolours on paper are big and eye-catching. ‘Time Wounds All Heals’ and ‘A work on seeds’ are thought provoking. ‘Seeds’ deals with the subject of regeneration, of modified and pest-resistant seeds. With four figures from different generations of a family holding seeds, it portends the continuity of a lifestyle that is doomed or hoodwinked by market forces into accepting skewed development.
The colours used and the gentle stroke play of brush in water is a clever way to garb the strong voice in a soft tone. It is highly effective.
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Sabin Mundappathi’s work ‘Re-plantation of the virtue of village’, a work in pencil on tea-washed paper, is striking. Its positioning as the central picture in the show is befitting. Sabin’s pencil shading, anatomy sketching and capture of motion of the figures is true to life.
Sanal C.S.’s untitled bright work stands out on the sheer strength of the usage of bold colours. The work with men wearing jerseys and with outlandish hair-dos, probably football players, is a witty piece of work. Finding a K.K. Muhammed work is a pleasant surprise as he, they say in art circles, is the reluctant artist or more so the reluctant displayer of his work. His work ‘The Body’, mixed media on paper, is delicately done, especially the background, and the image of a lying man, arching and taking aim is intense. The sense is one of curtailed freedom.
Siji R. Krishnan, a young artist from Mavelikkara, has exhibited three watercolours on rice paper. Siji’s process and attention to fine details enrich the texture of her work. If there is experiment then there is also depth in Siji’s nuanced work. Ambreesh Kumar’s, six small works in ink on paper and Sreedevi T.R.’s untitled work are the other two artist’s work on display.
The show put up by BC Collective is a simple exhibition, without a curatorial concept and hence the storylines are different and individualism holds the key.