Within the folds of muslin lay carefully wrapped memories. Memories which can be imagined through the tactility of the medium. Metaphors of human history that artist Debasish Mukherjee started relating to his emotions, he tells us.
Thus was born River Song, his recent body of work that is on view at Akar Prakar Contemporary.
These are a compilation of personal memories that find meaning through objects and materials.
The universality of these emotions makes them relatable to the spectator. It probes into the idea of home, spaces or place of origin.
His mixed-media sculptures and installations strive to scour through the subconscious mind to find that place of absolute comfort.
For Mukherjee, home is where the heart is. It is a repository for assurance and safe company.
“At the end of the day ‘feel at home’ is not good enough for me. It’s always ‘the home’, I look for. At home, every object has a small or large part of you, you are kind of having a continual dialogue with them… windows, walls, drawing board, everything has an important role to play in my life,” says Mukherjee, who has lived in Chhapra, Benares and Delhi.
Chhapra remains the most special place for him, a place closest to his ‘idea’ of home.
After spending 17 there, he moved to Benares to pursue fine arts from Banaras Hindu University.
Post his father’s retirement, they shifted to Delhi. “Moving homes was new for me and I longed for that space which now only existed in the landscape of my memory.
Shifting home was not a mere a shift of space for me, it was a shift of emotion, culture, language, people and most importantly sounds and visuals. It took long for me to accept Delhi as my own,” he says.
As an ode to his mother, untwisted threads pour downwards towards the viewer in a large sculptural piece. In the centre is a stand of crimson cascading seemingly at great velocity.
“This is an impression of the archetypal sari worn by Bengali women. I am reminded of my mother through it too,” he says.
As a homage to his father, he has created a beehive of thread spools in industrial texture, spreading out from the sides of a white cabinet, perhaps a reflection of how closely knit they both were.
In another striking portraiture piece is a pile of muslin bolts that have been arranged vertically, and on top of it are two 19th and early 20th-century family photographs.
All portraitures are layered and have a palimpsest quality, he says. These forms are accomplished with the fabric of muslin notwithstanding linen, cotton, wood, metal and glasses, and composed within this is a world of memories.
On view till October 4, at Akar Prakar Contemporary, D-43, Defence Colony