CULTURE

ARTSCAPE
Artist turns utility items into objets d’art
Rana A. Siddiqui

The utility items at homes or shops cease to be so when aged and worn out. Howsoever useful they are, if robbed of their beauty, they find their place in trash.

That’s what Mrs Sterre Sharma, a Dutch artist, an Indian by marriage, never wanted. In fact, she wanted utility items like trunks, letter boxes, locks, keys and kitchen wares to remain with their owner for life, even for generations.

A visit to her exhibition of paintings and redone utility items at Gallery 42, Defence Colony, proves the point. Here, utility items are metamorphosed into artifacts. There are trunks, kettles, real fruit dried and painted, glasses, jugs, almirahs and paintings—abstract and realistic— bestowed absolutely a new face through bright enamel shades, superimposed paintings, pictures, laces and semi-precious stones of vibrant colours.

Take for example, small and big trunks, decorated with bright enamel colours, in many geometrical, creative and patterned designs. Their novelty lies in the superimposed paintings of the artists surrounded by countless, vibrant shades all over the article. Her artistic caliber extends to more. Many other boxes and almirahs find beautiful landscape or scenery paintings carved and painted on them.

These are further beautified with designs fashioned with precious coloured stones, sparkles, pearls, and laces. Not only that, many of them find themes of different countries, European and Asian like bridal, play, hobby and art painted on them, liberally.

Then there are kettles, locks and keys on which the sand effect is produced by painting them with sand colour. The same with ordinary jugs and glasses. These are redesigned with generous application of glistering spots, flat and flowing lines spread across the entire items. “Importantly, these items, even if used frequently, neither lose their working capacity nor splendour because the colours used on these items are of very high quality which do not fade,” says Mrs Rummi Anand, the gallery owner.

There are real fruit dried and worked upon. A few of them have also been transformed into bird nest, painted with brown to lend a real effect.

Be it an ordinary alarm or wall clock, a telephone stand, deghchi or salt, flour container, all are imparted exclusive looks with creative designs, laboriously executed on them.

The gallery also has many of her paintings showing more of animals and birds than human forms, both on oils and acrylic. A few of them have abstract effect combined with realism defined with the help of superimposed pictures. Some of them are done on cardboard and frame of different geometrical figures like circle and rectangle that she has invented.

The painting that draws maximum attention is that of a Kathakali dancer. When imparted a closer look, it will show its headgear composed of matchbox and pan masala wrappers, painted in exactly the same colours and size as the real.

The artist, who is good at Chinese painting, pottery and sculpture, has special inclination for “ethnic India that is so colourful, bright and versatile”.

Hence, all of her paintings and utility items throw spectacular shades of luminous colours.

“The idea was to turn utility items into fun things. The world is going through serious times. Why not capture some light moments in the works of art which are eternal as well as useful?” Mrs Anand asks. True! To share these light moments, many are thronging the gallery. The date of the exhibition has been extended till November 30 on popular demand. Though this Indian panorama of colours, flanked by a foreign artist (Sterre) ironically, has more foreign buyers than Indians.

Music zone: Bismillah Khan casts a spell

Love has the power to derive pleasures from mistakes, discords and incapacity, thus felt the poet Rabindranath Tagore. So was it an easy exercise to get fun out of the snarls that the veteran Shahnai player Ustad Bismillah Khan oozed out before he left audience spellbound with his magical music.

The Ustad took almost a half hour to get them redo the stage and kept the audience deriving fun out of each sentence, he uttered annoyingly on the unorganized state of affairs on the dais. “Itni light ki kya zaroorat hai? Light band karo.” The maestro began and received a receptive ear and thundering applaud from the connoisseurs and the average listeners alike. Even after a long duration recital, the demand for more poured in, something which annoyed him again. “Arre ye saans ka baja hai. Hamain thoda dum to lene dijiye…” And he left the stage, rewarded with audiences’ grin, giggle and standing ovation.

Pak folk singer wows audience

The famous Pakistani Punjabi folk singer, Reshama who got fame in India after she sang ‘Lambi Judai’ from Subash Ghai’s film ‘Hero’, regaled the audience in a musical soiree held recently. At SawarUtsav, the music programme, sponsored by India Today Group the other day, she ended becoming a source of joy for the attentive audience, singing famous Punjabi folks and narrating her experience in foreign countries in typical local dialects. TNS