Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): Dusk falls like silent dew drops at the end of the day. All the shades of earth get dimmer and mingle with the horizon. A girl treads her weary way. Her shadows linger. The day ends. But life goes on. This is what a painting of Rita Jhunjhunwala – Ahista Ahista – longs to limn. It is one of her 34 works displayed at Bharat Bhawan in Bhopal as part of Bhopal Literature & Art Festival 2024. Each painting has been delineated through a poem composed by the artist.
The title of the painting exhibition is, A Leaf-strewn Ground. She says she had unwrapped her thoughts in words and then tinged it. In another painting - Saat Rangon (seven colours) - the rainbow of her imagination sprouts into a poem in which dance golden butterflies. She has used charcoal, stencil, paper cuttings, grey stamped papers, grey, blue, white and fire shades. Her paintings daub both murkiness and joyousness. But because grey and blue tinges tower over other shades, her works seem to be a portrait of gloomy thoughts.
Yet each of them tells a tale. Each of them exists on its own. A canvas – Sapne (dreams) made of acrylic, printed paper, stamped paper, gold foil and stencil – is a silhouette of dreams. There are a few human figures. Different shades used in the painting aptly outline dreams which have no rhyme or rhythm. The message is clear – life is otherwise a dream – because men’s wishes are never fulfilled. So whether our eyes are closed or open we dream.
Such dreams fade into the light of knowledge. Her ‘Yaadon ke Patjhar’ (autumn of reminiscence), made of acrylic, fabric, gold foil and stencil, consists of a few dry leaves, barren trees in light-white shade and a woman figure in light and dark tones. Fall of leaves indicates the blues. The lonely woman is like a solitary reaper. She works. She has to live for tomorrow. Then the artist has given colours to five elements, which everything in this temporal world is made up of, through five canvases. And each canvas is apparelled in a deep thought.
