It is the contrast of approach, themes, designs, colours, shapes and medium that made the ‘Samhati’ exhibition of B K College of Art and Craft a treat for the eyes and senses. Art Flow, a group of 22 students of B K College of Art and Craft, exhibited 56 works of paintings, photographs, plywood cut art and sculptures at the Lalit Kala Akademi.
Step into the exhibition hall of the Akademi and you would notice that the works were all a labour of love and striking was the free flow of ideas presented in fresh strokes. Interestingly, all the works were based on themes drawn from the society.
In the paintings section, Sisir Kumar Das impressed with his work in acrylic titled ‘Lost My Childhood’. With strong brush strokes, he created frame of a society trying to snatch away a child’s innocence. Santanu Kumar Meher, on the other hand, created two paintings titled Hungry Baby where a slum kid is shown trying to catch hold of a loaf of bread hung above him and another with an empty bowl in his hand.
Radhananda Yadav’s two works on Nature and Industrialisation were also interesting. With his detailed work, he portrayed no human form but just symbols to depict a changing society in the wake of rapid industrialisation that is both calm and restless. The painter also created an illusion of speed, depicting how the modern world is constantly running against time.
Likewise, Pragyan Paramita Behera raised the issue of child labour through her three paintings. In one of her works, she drew a school kid waiting to buy corn from another kid selling them.
With corruption being the most discussed issue now, Geetanjali Sahoo created a series on the topic. What caught attention was corruption and money being extracted from devotees in name of the Trinity at the Jagannath temple. She also explored the sub-conscious with ‘Buddha in Mediation’, in acrylic on canvas.
Some interesting paintings were done on plywood through engraving by Pravakar Sahoo and Dillip Majhi as well.
As far as installations are concerned, Umashankar Das’s works ‘Disapproval’ and ‘On Duty’ and ‘Prawn’ generated much interest among the viewers. “The installation Disapproval speaks about increasing concretisation. I have tried to draw a parallel between honey bees and buildings. Just like one honey bee starts working on a honey comb and others subsequently join, it is the same with buildings as well. From one high-rise, the city is today flooded with many of those,” said Umashankar.
Others like Chitrasena Behera, Rahul Mohakudu and Raghunath Behera worked upon interesting portraits and sculptures.
For all the students, Samhati was a platform to get a real feel of things to come, as they now get ready to step out of college. The exhibition concluded on Thursday.