Kamal Ghorui
Think of Tantra as a timeless tradition that goes back to antiquity. Distinguished Indian pedagogue and printmaker Dipak Banerjee went on a French Scholarship to Paris and Oslo.William Hayter’s Atelier 17 gave him the proficiency to study the process of multicoloured intaglios with the viscosity method.He worked in Norway for a while and came to head the printmaking dept of Benares Hindu University for two decades.
Western techniques and grammar brought him into a synergy in which he paired his search for his own roots and his works sank into the depths of Neo Tantra.At Gallerie Ganesha his show Tantric Tints and Spiritual Shades was a lesson in the historicity of Indian tradition and rituals and symbolism.
Shobha Bhatia of Gallerie Ganesha has been showing Banerjee’s prints for more than 2 decades. Bhatia has single handedly run her gallery with devotion .She was the first one to do exhibitions of both Paresh Maity and Jayasri Burman in the 1990’s. And this suite is a study in contemplation in a world torn by wars.
Bhatia says: “The use of vegetable dyes in his paintings imparts a diffused luminance, like the internal radiance of an evolved being. His work cannot be categorized strictly into either tantric or abstract and lies somewhere in between, with simple visuals that attract and draw the viewer within. To quote the artist himself is the best , “I humbly make an effort to liberate what is within.”
Temple
Temple is Dipak Banerjee’s etching that draws the viewer into a vortex of an inner experience of
all that exists, through all time and space, being a single all-encompassing and unbroken field of awareness.Divine consciousness is the spirit that he extols all through this exhibition that invites silence.
Trident is a neatly aligned space of geometry and symbolism.His understanding of multiplicity was not merely superficial but an actualisation of a timeless consciousness that creates its own conversations of concentration.His colours have a surreal edge of grace and gravitas.
Brahmakamal
His work Brahmakamal is an illumination of unbounded light as well as form with the lotus at the helm as the flow of consciousness is creates as a stencil of different forms and energy sections.Tensile and tactile are his strokes and his love for soft hues of colour tones and the tenor of deep absorption.His idea of creating different frames within a frame is ingenuous.
Vishwa Bhramand
His Vishwa Bhramand brings alive the Upanishads. The locus of self awareness speaks in echoes of realisation and resonance.Here within is a pulsation of pure wisdom and soothing tranquility.He reincarnates spiritual fervour with colour and contour in a language of what is sublime.
Saraswati
Goddess Saraswati resides within this Prussian blue beauty and makes us face an inner realisation and perception of the universe flowing in the river of a silent dance of prana because it is the breath of Brahman.The triangles squares and the script beneath all become a choreography of yogic analogues and self control.
Nataraja
The Nataraja in this suite represents a culmination of Indian spiritual visual traditions. The Nataraja is pared down to abstract minimalism, Banerjee creates a commentary for an audience for whom Shiva’s dual nature as creator and destroyer is considered worthy of exploration and reverence.
Nataraj has ancient sacred associations within the art of India. This image also references Shiva with purity, perfection, resurrection and spiritual growth.
The shift in scale and minimalist mooring within a field of intense and dulcet shading expands its meaning. This etching is about iconography and texture and flat plains of colour with minute brushstrokes . Banerjee was master of manipulation in the etching process, his rhythmic, slow, deliberate handling reveals a meditative intensity and concentration.
Vishnu
The Vishnu in this suite represents a geometric culmination of Indian spiritual visual traditions.The square and the circles become the embodiment of grammar , a quiet drama is heightened through colour in ways that echo earlier Bengali lithographs. This image does not seek to stir but it rewards recognition of the ripples of meditation. Banerjee refines his representation of the subject and invites the viewer to partake of a language of spirituality and Kati that is fluent in myth, ritual, and visual codes—and creates a commentary of dualities within devotional practices and beliefs.
Bindu
Banerjee’s Bindu is an enchanting mixed media on canvas of a lotus within a concentric circle of amorphous gradations and textures that look like alphabets in devanagari script. The lotus is his cosmic symbolism.Reproduced through soft and sombre colours, his lotus image tells us of its being and how it is touched, addressed, adorned, and replaced—its power reinforced through devotion rather than rarity.
Images: Galerie Ganesha
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