{"id":187029,"date":"2013-08-29T21:04:17","date_gmt":"2013-08-29T15:34:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tehelka.com\/?p=187029"},"modified":"2013-08-29T21:04:17","modified_gmt":"2013-08-29T15:34:17","slug":"jesus-and-the-technicolour-dreamcoat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/jesus-and-the-technicolour-dreamcoat\/","title":{"rendered":"Jesus and the Technicolour Dreamcoat"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Twist
Twist in the tale<\/strong> Parekh with one of her\u00a0works in The Last Supper<\/em> series \u00a0Photo:<\/strong> Vijay Pandey<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>
\nPicture The Last Supper<\/em>. Jesus and his 12 disciples sitting across a table laden with food and drink, not in Leonardo da Vinci\u2019s classical Renaissance style, but painted in the unmistakable tradition of Indian folk art. The eyes are wide, the human figures asymmetrical, the dimensions flat and da Vinci\u2019s decidedly more grand and solemn backdrop replaced by colourful curtains and a smiling sun and moon. The painting is part of The Last Supper\u00a0<\/em> series, a distinctly witty reinterpretation of Jesus\u2019 life by artist Madhvi Parekh.
\nIn a career spanning 50 years, Parekh has exhibited in almost 100 solo and group shows, establishing herself as one of the most respected contemporary artists in India. It is tempting to label her art as simple, with folk and tribal accents. However, as critics have pointed out, there\u2019s more to her body of work; she cleverly incorporates her folk art sensibilities into subjects that are, in turn, drawn from her personal experiences. And so, a typical frame would have animals and birds she saw while growing up in a little village in Gujarat, as well as tall buildings from the cities she has travelled to all over the world. As her contemporary, artist Anjolie Ela Menon says, \u201cShe has successfully contemporised elements of folk and tribal art.\u201d
\nThe Last Supper<\/em> is the 71-year-old artist\u2019s latest work in that tradition. The fact that the Biblical theme differs from her repertoire of indigenous content makes it all the more interesting. And though the women that generally populate her works are absent in this series, there is still that element of rustic nature and fantasy. In The Portrait of Christ<\/em> I, the all-important star that guided the three wise men to Jesus\u2019 birth is accompanied by the sun and the moon, the divine elements in Hindu mythology. To draw a crowd outside of art aficionados, the first viewing of this work was held in Bishop\u2019s College chapel in Kolkata in 2011. For a week, the paintings stayed in the church, open to the public that came for mass. And now, the Seagull Foundation for the Arts has brought the exhibition to Delhi\u2019s Visual Arts Gallery.
\nParekh has always had a child-like fascination for Biblical tales. As a young girl in Sanjaya, the village in Gujarat, she and her three sisters would always be excited about Christmas. \u201cI also had a friend. She was Christian. She would tell me stories, about immaculate conception, the birth in the stable. Those were lovely stories,\u201d recalls Parekh. In 2007, she visited Jerusalem with her artist husband Manu, and the interest eventually translated into an idea for a series. It was a portrait of Christ, absolutely serene and beautiful, in Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial, that left her astounded. She also watched people burst into reverent tears at the Unction Stone, where Christ\u2019s body was laid for anointment, or in churches, and all spots considered holy. \u201cThese are stories of miracles. There are many in Hindu myths too. It\u2019s very interesting work,\u201d she now says.
\nYet, the shapes on canvas are anything but reverent. They are, in curator Alka Pande\u2019s words, \u201ca cross-cultural translation of Biblical stories\u201d. As Parekh\u2019s interest in Christianity preceded her knowledge, she found herself giving her own meanings to Biblical symbols. Noah\u2019s Ark carries 12 disciples, there is a woman seated at the table in The Last Supper (she may or may not be Mary Magdalene) and Jesus the shepherd in Christ Travelling With Animals<\/em> could be a shepherd from any Indian village. \u201cThe flora and fauna of the Bible is drawn in her own style,\u201d Pande points out. And because her point of discovery has been Jerusalem, the city\u2019s tangled history with the Abrahamic faiths pops up on her canvas, with church spires and domes rubbing shoulders.
\nAs an artist, Parekh does not attach much meaning to what goes where on canvas. \u201cThere is no particular reason; sometimes things just happen on canvas. It is fantasy,\u201d she says. Perhaps that\u2019s why watching these frames is liberating for a viewer, as they feel free to draw their own interpretations. \u201cWhat you see around yourself, in the light and in the shadows, can be art. I want to paint what anyone would understand,\u201d says Parekh. There is no grand vision behind this series, but there is a story, a narrative that makes these works even more engaging and accessible.
\nPerhaps this irreverence has something to do with the fact that Parekh does not have any formal training. She only started drawing at the age of 24, a time when she was living in Bombay and pregnant with her first daughter, and took to painting as a hobby. Her interest was piqued and soon Manu began to teach her the basics. At the beginning, she\u2019d draw circles and squares, and soon she started attaching limbs to those shapes and drawing figures from her village. Staircases became a running motif, an inspiration drawn from a childhood accident when she fell from the stairs. \u201cIt\u2019s quite a progress, from drawing squares on a piece of paper to painting The Last Supper<\/em>. Sometimes I get embarrassed looking back at my early work,\u201d Parekh laughs. \u201cBut it is important to see it, and remember where one comes from.\u201d In this progression, argues Menon, she became one of the first artists of her generation to follow in the tradition of Jamini Roy\u2019s folk and tribal art. The reverse painting technique that Parekh eventually began to use in 2006 was inspired by Nalini Malani, an artist Parekh has collaborated with on group shows.
\nParekh is not precious about admitting her influences and borrowings; her originality still shines through. \u201cAt a time when Indian art was taking a very serious turn, there was wit and humour in her work,\u201d Menon says. In his essay The Centre and the Periphery,<\/em> critic Jyotindra Jain writes that \u201cMadhvi was not trained in an art school but it is not that she has had no exposure to the world of modern art or to new materials and techniques. She is poised on the fence between her personal world, \u2018unspoilt\u2019 by \u2018training\u2019, and the formal history of art, which continuously and consciously explores new possibilities of expression.\u201d In the basement of her south Delhi residence, a massive canvas of a new version of The Last Supper is being finished. The style is the same as her other works, but the colour scheme, she says, has been inspired by Pablo Picasso\u2019s iconic Guernica.
\nToday, Madhvi commands both respect and a high price. Her 48\u201dx72\u201d canvas (Portrait of Christ I<\/em>) is priced 12 lakh. Her standing in the art fraternity is that of an artist unafraid of pushing the boundaries of imagination. Though she admits it was Manu who taught her how to draw, she is careful about demarcating their work. \u201cMy husband, my daughter Manisha and I all paint, but our work is different from each other,\u201d she says firmly. The Last Supper<\/em> is a convincing evidence of her characteristic humour and a very personal, very unique style.
\nThe Last Supper will be on at the Visual Arts Gallery, New Delhi, from 1 to 7 September<\/em>
\naradhna@tehelka.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Madhvi Parekh takes on Christ, da Vinci and Picasso with charm, simplicity and, above all, humour, says Aradhna Wal <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":73,"featured_media":187046,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[21],"tags":[7611,7051,5933,7612,7613,7614,7615],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187029"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/73"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=187029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187029\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=187029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=187029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=187029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}