A compelling narrative of silence...
Chobisa’s paintings are literally ‘sculptures in silence’ as he puts it. His works are not abstract, they are a result of a wellthought-out process that makes the void, the silence speak.
The essence of water is to preserve and give life. It cleanses and maintains the balance of nature. Yet, it can either be silent or a destructive force. It could wash away everything that comes in its way or it could lend a soothing balm to our inflamed mind and body. This paradox is used by contemporary artists Dilip Chobisa and Tanmoy Samanta in their latest exhibition A(Void) that is showcased at the Gallery Espace till May 20.
Layered mixed-media canvases, graphite on paper in monochromatic colours are intriguing. Chobisa’s paintings are literally “sculptures in silence” as he puts it. His works are not abstract, they are a result of a well-thought-out process that makes the void, the silence speak. The stairways, open windows with curtains, doors in grey and white and black lend an eerie silence. It compels the viewer to stand and find a meaning that’s absent. To look beyond what is apparent so that in the process, a dialogue between the conscious and the sub-conscious could be initiated. Chobisa’s works also reflect his personal ideology. His emphasis on the minimal is very effective.
“I like to keep things within and don’t feel the need to be angry. I am looking, listening but not reacting. This helps me to create my sculptures in 2-d”, says Chobisa.
Chobisa’s paintings have multiple layers and aremore personal.
“I am trying to fight with myself as I am trying to reflect my personal state of mind onto the canvas... I think I have been neglected by society and this psychological behaviour leads to a void,” explains Chobisa.
The paintings are graphite on paper, coloured dust, wooden ply, acrylic, glass and painted wooden frame all help Chobisa remain coherent in his thoughts. Titles of the paintings like “There inside”, “Memory of empty basement” and “I was listening” are also wellchosen for they add to the tangible visuals. They speak of something that just happened before your eyes. And this quality comes from Chobisa’s fabulous understanding of the psychological and behavioureal pattern. For Chobisa “this creation as well as the damage happens simultaneously”. Chobisa compares the process of beginning a work as a reproductive act. “It’s like giving birth to abstract liquid thought and transforming it into form,” he says.
The first stage is to materialise the thought, the second is to compel the material to go beyond so the blank space can be dominated by the richness of autobiography. Even though they may seem like sketches illustrating a room, Chobisa’s graphite on paper works are vignettes constructed from memory constituted by pared down fragments exclusive of miscellanea, such as objects or any other thing that may presumably convey sentiments. They are visual transcriptions of his remembrance of emotionally charged sites. The ensuing architectural assemblages are not the result of references but of diagrammatically accessing the emotional equilibrium or disequilibrium that marked his encounter with the site in question to which he may or may not have forged a sense of belonging.
“I draw it with the sense of my loneliness,” he says.
This concept of emptying out the self in silence is taken a step further by Samanta. He distances himself from the nostalgia and seems more interested in void from where the artworks originate.
“Playing around volume and void has always been part of my practice. They complement and contradict...contest each other. In this suit of works void takes over. Void speaks volumes. While doing these works, I thought void as time and space and void is the whole universe of memory. The emptiness where little life and dwelling throb — like in a dark silence of womb, life throbs!” says Samanta.
The works are more geometric and experimental as compared to Chobisa’s. If “Nocturne-I” canvas with pasted Nepalese handmade paper, powder pigment and acrylic, uses geometric figures in dark green mirroring the crisis-cross lines, then “Nocturne-II” becomes darker with lot of circles and half-circles being used. I particularly liked the “Pole star” gouache on Nepalese handmade paper which has black stars superimposed on each to create one unit on a circle of green. “The Yellow Girl” looks like a silhouette of a girl from whose head the world map jets out. “Moonscape”, a recycled book, in gouache and Nepalese handmade paper, is eye-catching as it uses the “D” used in geometry to great effect.
Both artists present a compelling narrative of silence. The aim seems to be on plumbing the depths of human mind and to make one’s personal experiences public.
“These works are evocative and I have perceived void not as a negative space or absence of something but a pregnant space, which allows me to introspect. One might refer to Tao landscape where absence of details in misty landscape spoke of philosophies of life”, Samanta signs off.