Asia-Pacific, Development & Aid, Headlines

CULTURE-INDIA: Painting Peace

Ranjit Devraj

NEW DELHI, May 29 2007 (IPS) - “War begins in the minds of men,” says India’s leading art connoisseur and promoter of Indian contemporary art, Satish Kumar Modi, citing from the charter of the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO).

Deciding to do something about it Modi, heir to one of India’s major business empires, set about commissioning depictions of peace on canvas by internationally-acclaimed Indian painters for an international road show with the theme ‘Power of Peace’.

In an interview with IPS, Modi said he spent close to four million dollars painstakingly and lovingly putting together this unique collection of 52 canvases by such brush wielders as the Dubai-based M.F. Husain, S.H. Raza who lives and works in Paris and the British-born Uday Dhar.

”It was well worth it. We live in a time of conflict and confrontation, of wars, and terrorist attacks that arise from religious intolerance and hunger for power. We need to communicate and what better medium than art, that universal language? Unlike words which are spoken, heard and sometimes forgotten, art on canvas stays forever and so does the message it conveys,” said Modi.

For Modi, talking with some of the most creative minds in the world and getting them to contribute to the endeavour was half the fun. ‘’Each artist had his own world-view and saw peace in his or her own light.”

To Raza, whose paintings are known for their spiritual quality, peace appears as a series of concentric circles, painted in earthen tones around a dazzling creamy core that has the effect of spinning out light. Titled ‘Shanti’ (peace) the depiction is of the ”brightness of life, slowly drained away by the white light of eternity.”

And for M.F. Husain peace is inseparable from love – the unconditional, constant and selfless love that Radha the milkmaid had for the flautist, cowherd god Krishna. ‘’This is the love that each of us must feel for all of humanity and peace will be achieved forever.”

As a collection of contemporary Indian work it is not surprising that three of the painters, Akbar Padamsee, Suhas Bahulkar and Shuvaprasanna turned up canvases with images of Mahatma Gandhi, India’s apostle of peace and non-violence.

Explaining his portrait of Gandhi standing in the midst of broken religious icons, Bahulkar said: ‘’While no single religion contains all the truth, the heart of religion lies in seeking truth in companionship with others, not claiming to have all the truth. Gandhi’s path teaches that people from different religions can cultivate a culture of peace by learning from the various world religions, even as they remain rooted in their own.”

The Power of Peace exhibition series premiered in Paris in October 2006 and was then shown in Bali, Indonesia where UNESCO’s Global Peace Forum was held, Jan. 21 – 23. Its next stop will be Tokyo.

”On Jul. 18 – 23 we will be holding an exhibition at the Ueno Royal Museum. Collections are being exhibited at several locations in Britain, this year, including the House of Lords in October,” Modi said.

Testimony to the sheer brilliance of the collection is the fact that at several of the exhibitions, art collectors offering to buy up pieces had to be constantly turned away. ‘’These exhibitions are non-commercial and that is why they are invariably held at prestigious museums and venues. The idea is for people to view these works of art and carry away the theme of peace,” said Modi.

He added that the work of mounting exhibitions has been greatly facilitated by the prestigious International Institute of Fine Arts (IIFA), located outside New Delhi, and of which he is the chairman. IIFA has collaboration agreements with prestigious institutions such as the University of the Arts in London and the La Salle- SIA college of arts in Singapore.

The touring exhibition, besides the intended objective of promoting peace, has had the effect of introducing to the world contemporary Indian art, often drowned out by the wealth of creations from a culturally rich historical past.

Where a whole genre was missing, Indian contemporary paintings by Husain, Raza and others figure regularly in the catalogues of auctioneers like Sotheby and Christies. A point has now been reached where personal preferences are making way for pure business propositions in Indian art.

“Indian contemporary art is one of the very best in the world and the Indian form is vital today for the overall growth of art,” commented Raza.