The word landscape conjures up images of verdant spaces in the lap of nature. However, for most of us living in the cities, it is about time we woke up to the urban reality, where increasingly, landscape has also come to mean “boulders of concrete and towers of steel” and such other manmade structures that are part of our mindscape. In fact, it was on my first visit to New York, that I understood the real meaning of a cityscape and what all it encompasses.
Manhattan left me awestruck with its gravity defying skyscrapers and the romance of its twinkling evening lights and the night sky that was imbued with a golden hue. How can those of us who have grown up in cities where the night sky is light-polluted with several hues of sodium lights, even understand that the sky is ink blue and the stars are just an arm’s length away? For the fact remains that this glass-paned concrete jungle, to use a cliché, is our Rashomon reality. The inherent isolation catches you unaware with its loneliness in the large space of the urban reality as it shrinks to fit in the societal pre-conceived parameters. The show Urban(e) Paradox at the Art Spice Gallery of the Metropolitan Hotel reflects this reality in no uncertain terms. The show features works by Niren Sengupta, Sudip Roy, Sanjay Bhattacharya, Niladri Paul and Bikash Poddar.
Artists recount stories with understated understanding and sensitivity towards street lives, and gently shake one to wake up to the pathos of urban reality. Never mind the varied choice of colours. To my mind, the one person whose work stands out for actually being true to the theme of the show is senior artist Prof. Niren Sengupta.
His works are like silent urban screams of a people perceived through the fast paced rush of a moving vehicle, frozen in the mindscape of the artist. The imagery is replete with strands of popular culture that have become an inextricable part of the urban experience. The colours are juxtaposed with the shadows of the flashing neon lights. The expressions of people on the street are captured in the eye view within the cocooned silence of a glass pane. And silence can be deafening as it roars within.
The vibrant energy of Niladri Paul’s perceived urban reality is captured in no uncertain terms. The shadows of the night stride quietly yet envelop all within its embrace. They loom not merely on the surface, but are deeply etched in the psyche. That they have the power to affect at the deep psychological level is evident in his subjects.
Sanjay Bhattacharya revisits the emptiness of the urban context sans their veil. The curiosity of reality recounts its own tale.
It is with deep conviction that Sudip Roy explores the sensibilities of the urban reality through the prism of the socio-cultural-ritualistic belief systems imposed on the rural or the semi rural situation. The protagonists in his works become the metaphor for the faceless human entity trapped as they are in various time zones and situations.
The delicate imagery of Bikash Poddar’s works is replete with the nuances that conjure up images that celebrate the magnitude of the urban landscape making it difficult to say whether it is the colours that fill up your senses or is it the forms that attract, but undoubtedly the combined impact is powerful and definite.
This show is not screaming from roof tops that artists think differently or that they do things differently. It is just doing it without making a fuss — just the way they live their lives — multi-tasking, co-existing in different time zones, multi-layering their relationships and yet finding their own creative spaces to explore that little bit of themselves that really counts. It is indeed about time that the parameters of what constitutes landscapes, actually include within its ambit, urban reality.
The boat ride to see the night skyline of Manhattan is fresh in my mindscape as are the towering buildings of Singapore. The rushing lift to the Burj Khalifa in Dubai to the 150th floor set many a pulse aflutter.
But the innate desire of humankind to be different from each other, has resulted in buildings that have literally “risen” above more of the same kind, to create new iconic landmarks that have become one with the name of the city and are the new Taj Mahals of the 21st century.
Alka Raghuvanshi is an art writer, curator and artist