Sculpting poetry, but with a message, in stone

Ramesh K Dhiman

Chandigarh, fabled for its architectural marvels, wide-open boulevards lined with ornamental trees, emerald-green gardens and meticulously maintained parks, sprawled over miles, has earned an endearing soubriquet of the City Beautiful. The other prominent landmarks dotting the cityscape make it a Mecca for tourists. The water sculptures at the Sector 17 plaza, the Garden Sculptures at Leisure Valley and Terrace Garden and the Museum and Art Gallery in Sector 10 et al, have added a new one at that, namely the City of Sculptures. Not very off from these artistic wonders, sedately nestles the first-of-its-kind sculpture park at Kalagram (Chandigarh), silhouetted against the backdrop of the Shivalik Hills.

As you enter the five-acre sprawling sculpture park through the pergola-covered walkways, flanked by stone images on both sides. As you thread your way through the trellis-work corridors, you suddenly stray into the well-manicured lush-green lawns, lending luminosity to the paradisiacal ambience. You fix your gaze at the minuscule to massive sculptures lined up, you are strayed into a wonderland, hemmed by ornamental trees, housing a mosaic of sculptures offering a rousing welcome to the visiting connoisseur of art. These finely-chiselled images in all shapes and sizes have been created out of black, white, pink, yellow colour stones, sourced from Rajasthan, Gujarat and elsewhere. The fine cuts and contours of these images speak volumes of their evocative silence.

The high-end sculpture park, housing some 220 stone and 60 wooden sculptures, each telling a tale of its own, speak of the mind and the mission of the master creators. The sculptures here remind us of the creative art at Khajuraho (MP), the Ajanta and Ellora caves (Maharashtra) and the rock-hewn Masroor temples in the Kangra Valley (HP). Back home, the Chandigarh Rock Garden, a unique wonderland conceptualised by saint-artist Nek Chand, continues to attract enthusiasts from across the globe. A treasure-trove of sorts, the park became the cynosure of all inquisitive eyes when the North Zone Culture Centre (NZCC) held the first-ever sculpture camps here in 2002, at which acclaimed sculptors from across the country showed up and showcased the jugglery of their deft hands. The camp became an annual feature with time. A perfect ambience of the locale caught the fancy of the Punjabi film fraternity to shoot films in a natural setting. A hit Punjabi flick, ‘Kismet’, and some other art films were shot here.

Spread over five acres, the park is skirted by lush green lawns, groves of ornamental trees, lending luminosity to its paradisiacal ambience. Each sculpture bears the name of its creator with the date. The sculptures reflect recurring themes, ranging from mystic to mundane, sensuous to sublime and so on. These reflect the mood of Mother Nature, reflect the role of a quintessential woman as a mother, a wife, a daughter and so on, prominent mythical figures, and other manifestations of the divine and its ethereal beauty and bounty, which is the hallmark of the sculptures park here. The quaint little village, as it is endearingly called, has an open-air theatre with an ambient backdrop, offering a typical rural metaphor.

In an informal chit-chat, NZCC program officer Yashwinder Sharma ‘Jassi’ goes nostalgic as he tells us “The park as you see it today is the outcome of the concerted efforts of the NZCC besides the consistent moral support extended by the sculptors, who worked with a great missionary zeal to make this dream come true. A string of sculpture and wood carving camps, organised under the aegis of the NZCC, enabled the master sculptors to create these stunning statuettes and sculptures. They made these mute structures of stone speak the language of the heart. Prominent among those acclaimed sculptors are Padma Shri recipient Biman Bihari Das, Shiv Singh, D Rajasekharan Nair, Latika Katt, M Dhirmani, Pankaj Gehlot and many more, who had nurtured hopes to see it as an international entity.

Jassi further adds, “The outstanding feature of this first outdoor garden sculpture park in the country is that a good number of art lovers, who have little or no access to the creative stone or wooden works housed in galleries or museums, feel free to pay a visit to the park here in natural setting. Since entry to the park is free, commoners and connoisseurs come calling to strike an emotive chord with the speaking stones. By bringing this unique feature to the City Beautiful, we had in mind to taking out the concept out of the confines of the enclosed museums and art galleries. The NZCC’s impassioned endeavour has augured well as it has succeeded in attracting more enthusiasts and sensitise their artistic sensibilities, besides giving a boost to the tourism in the city. Even local art college students are encouraged to participate in the camps to enrich their knowledge. We are also toying with the idea of having terracotta, fiber and metal sculptures added to the park”.