Tuesday, September 9, 2014
Dialogue with Nature
Santosh Verma’s paintings represent human mind’s deep engagement
with the reality that is abstract and concrete at the same time. I think his
painting is continuously evolving with the expanding horizon of his
consciousness. In his paintings one can read his journey from the place where
he was born and became conscious of his existence for the first time to the
place where he is encountering the complex metropolitan culture. These places
are not merely geographical areas but they are simultaneously cultural and
philosophical fields. The changing shapes and deepening colours in his
paintings indicate his encounter with this new field which is a significant
constituent of today’s globalizing world where chaos is the order of the day
and his paintings reflect the human longing to search for order. It is in this
sense that the language of the painter and that of the nature overlap or meet
and invite the humans to ‘feel for the
things themselves’.
This makes Santosh as one of the representative voices from
India whose paintings resonate with the Latin American counterparts on its
claim for authenticity of the experience and resistance to the globalizing
universalism. The emerging social reality in the metropolitan city spaces
is determined by the market relations, machines and feelings of painful transitions.
Santosh proves the Jungian point that human psyche has a certain autonomy vis-à-vis the
immediate material matrix as his recent paintings continue to defy the logic of
the urban space to a great extent and remain linked with the enchanting
mysteries of nature. One is reminded of the image of a kite flier whose kite is
flying high in the sky but the thread is still in his hand.
In this sense Santosh Verma’s paintings represent the emerging
thought process in India reflected in the contemporary art, literature and
social science together, which derives its energy from within, from the
authenticity of its relationship with the social reality that one belongs to
and from the commitment one has to its constitution and transformation. If
tomorrow it would be possible to draw a pattern in this alternative thought
process that the world requires today from the expressions of experiences in
India reality, Santosh Verma’s paintings would be considered as one of the
pioneers in this. I can see something emerging at a very abstract level of
ideas that might challenge the very foundations of the modernity without
lapsing into postmodernity. I can see a new world of ideas emerging which is
trying to reclaim the existential aspects of human beings in which a creative
dialogue could be initiated between ‘humans and nature’, ‘mind and body’, and
‘individual and society’. In the field of painting Santosh Verma will be known
for articulating this metamorphosis.
Dr. Manindra Nath Thakur
Centre for Political Studies
Jawaharlal Nehru University
New Delhi
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