The New Nation - Internet Edition

Sheikh Arif Bulbon

Tarun Ghosh is one of the outstanding artists of his generation who despite winning top awards in such prestigious events at the Asian Art Biennale and National Art Exhibition, prefers to remain in the shadows, doing painting, what he does best. The present exhibition is his first solo in nearly 35 years of his career. The solo art exhibition of Tarun Ghosh titled 'Myth, Memory and Motherland' was held at the Galleri Kaya at Uttara in the city recently. The exhibition showcased 102 artworks. Of those works, five sculptures made of stone, wood and metal, 10 large paintings and 87 other paintings. Tarun completed these works between 1973 and 2008, using oil, acrylic, ink, gouache, watercolour and mixed media.

Ambassador of Denmark Einar H Jensen inaugurated the two-week long exhibition as chief guest, while artist Monirul Islam was also present on the occasion.

Tarun first exhibited his work, outside the academic events, in Dhaka Painters' fisrt exhibition in 1974 at the Art College gallery. The group also held an exhibition in Kushtia in the next year, which was organised from a belief that art should be dispersed throughout the country. There was no oil or watercolour in the market, so Tarun had to make his own colour by mixing glycerine, bubble gum, dyes and oxides. His passion was the war of liberation, so he began painting (about 15 in all) the war and his personal response to the war as subject. In most of these paintings, the viewpoint is that of an onlooker, who sees the war as a momentous event happening with great speed and energy.

Tarun said, "From the beginning of my career till 1989, I have painted a series on the Liberation War on 6 ft x 8 ft canvases. I made some 60 to 70 paintings. Then I worked on another 100 or so paintings as part of a series on the mythical character 'Behula," he recalled.

Then Tarun turned to painting birds, portraits, various aspects of nature and his personal feelings.

"Many of these works have been sold out and taken to places I don't know and therefore these works could not be included in the exhibit. Some series are no longer integral," he said.

The exhibition also displayed a number of metallic sculptures made out of discarded horns and trumpets. Tarun has always been interested in sculpture, but didn't have time or preparation to pursue his interest. In remarking these trumpets and horns into objects of art, he has been interested in foregrounding an earlier preoccupation - exploring the dual regions of sound and silence. The trumpets in his sculpture are muted, but their very appearance suggests sound. It is the sound behind silence that is Tarun's objective.

The exhibition also had put together a number of painted stones, which dot the floor of the gallery. Each piece of smooth, rounded stone, according to Tarun, has a thousand year old narrative that began in same craggy hill or rock face. The stone evoke the memory of an earlier life, in which the river, water, which has smoothed the edge of these stones and given them a rounded shape and earth play important roles. Each stone is like a letter or rune in nature's complicated alphabet.

Although this was first solo exhibition of Tarun Ghosh, but it certainly shown an artist in all his maturity and brilliance and in all his humility and humanity.