A primary school project

A few years back, I had gone for a parent-teacher meeting to my younger daughter’s school. Discovering your child was the challenge for the parents. Students of this pre-primary class had made cards for their families. Parents had to locate their respective ward’s card. This particular card brought smile and inquisitiveness on everybody’s faces.

“My mother makes lovely cakes

My father eats and sleeps

My sister gives me lots of hugs”

That is how my little one explained her family without knowing that when her father came home, he was on leave from his out-station postings. It was not easy for me to explain her observation to teachers and other parents. That little girl has grown up now and is going to a residential school within next few days.

She is unable to hide her enthusiasm for her new school, new friends, new place to live and most importantly for her newly achieved freedom where no parent is around to hassle her. But I am worried. Will she be able to deal with everything?  Will she get lost in her new surroundings? We all go through this when our children want to sail alone in the wild sea. For me this is déjà vu. Same feelings rushed to my heart and mind when my elder daughter left home for her boarding school and then for college. I held myself that time, and will be able to do the same again.

Memories take me 17 yrs. back, the day this bundle of joy had arrived bringing happiness to everybody in the family. Till today she is the baby of the family who can drive everybody mad with her negligence and at the same time can bring a smile on everybody’s faces with her jovial mannerisms. That mischievous look in her little eyes, which I adored when she was younger, is still persistent.  

                                                       The World From A Child's Eyes

                                                                One Of The Projects        

I have tried to preserve her childhood innocence hidden in her primary school projects. She made lovely cards on my birthdays and lovely biscuit cakes (she could only manage that without any help) on mother’s day. It is a different matter that she always wanted a return gift for her hard work.

There will be a void at home without her.  There will be no noise of our TV or music, no nagging for going out with her friends, nobody to argue with to prove her point of view and if not accepted, then furious. But at the same time there will be nobody forever ready to help the whole world, nobody to hug me over small issues, nobody to welcome even the smallest gestures of gratitude from others.

But her innocence, her ability to speak her mind naively is intact. I wonder if the world around her will appreciate it or hate her for this. This concern will always worry me because the ways of this world are very strange.

Maybe one day she will be able to take a few underprivileged kids to McDonald’s for a treat with her own money to let them experience every child’s favorite eating place. That’s her current dream! 

To Be Or Not To Be

The reluctance to put away childish things may be a requirement of genius- Rebecca Pepper Sinkler.

This quote from my previous post has remained with me. Whenever I look at this painting by Rahul Mukherjee, ”To Be Or Not To Be” I go back to my childhood. A Fox running away from sour grapes, a young child flying the kite (an activity enjoyed by all of us), Gandhiji preaching ahimsa lessons and acrobats doing stunts in the air mesmerizing us.

But like any adult, I too, draw interpretations from these characters. The fox and sour grapes represent the aspirations, which are not achieved. The child flying a kite is aiming to reach the sky. Gandhiji is symbolizing all moral values we learnt while growing up but his shadow represents the confusion caused by the gradual changes in social values. In my opinion, the acrobats are the thoughts rushing to our minds.

Mukherjee’s paintings represent the conflicts in an individual’s life or in a society. It may be the difference in values of a child and an adult or the conflict in the values of real life and ideal life. All his paintings depict a young boy, representing the thought process of a young Mukherjee, who does not understand the startling hypocrisy of mankind.

 To Be Or Not To Be

All of Rahul Mukherjee’s works, acrylic or watercolor have another prominent character, “shadow”, which redefines the concept of science through his own medium. The shadows in his paintings don’t follow the laws of light. According to Mukherjee, they are the psychological mirror of an individual. There is no confinement of the expressions for an artist!

It happens to all of us at a time in life when we cannot identify with the opportunist value system of our surroundings and wish to go back to unfussy and innocent childhood again. I wish the idea of time machine takes shape someday in real.

As a faculty member at fine arts faculty at M.S.University(Vadodara), he is playing the role of a guru in true sense by starting HUB- a platform for budding artists.  

Wirey Circus

"My fan mail is enormous. Everyone is under six."                                                        

  Alexander Calder

“Our generation is very smart”. My daughters have told me n number of times whenever I admire their skills and awareness. I do agree with them and the process of evolution of human mind.

But what happens when something goes wrong?

“You know it’s the fault of our genes” comes the reply with lightening speed.

Why are they not ready to credit their genes for their better skills?

A generation gap has to be maintained for the sake of argument.

But I am sure Alexander Sandy Calder must have thanked his grandfather and father for providing him with the genome of a super talented artist. What if he tried to deviate from the family occupation? In fact, his deviation brought another dimension to his artistic skills: application of physics in his abstract kinetic sculptures with moving parts. According to Calder, who was a qualified engineer, to an engineer good enough means perfect. With an artist there is no such thing as perfect.

Mobile, circus, wire, jewelry and physics associated with an artist! Amazing effects! That’s how we can describe Alexander Calder, who changed the course of modern art. Calder tried to bring art in common man’s life by making jewelry with wires. Maybe he had this futuristic idea of high gold price and popularity of funky and chunky jewelry among young generation!

But his real magic was a circus in a suitcase, which was inspired by a real circus. I love the drawings of his circus characters he made before giving them 3d shape with wire, rubber, cork, buttons, bottle caps, wood and other objects he found close by.

Acrobat

Sword swallower

Dancer on stilts

Ring master

These drawings prints are gift from some one very dear to me. Everytime I look at these posters, they bring a smile on my face. As if the acrobat is going to lead all the other characters in performing the task their creator had assigned them in his circus. The two dimensional sketches have a magical effect on everybody who takes a look at them.

Maybe it was a child inside Alexander, which inspired him to make his “Cirque Calder”.

The reluctance to put away childish things may be a requirement of genius- Rebecca Pepper Sinkler.

Alexander Calder a true genius who inculcated art in every part of life, a toy, pot, tapestry, jewelry, painting, installations stabile or a mobile.

Kolorful Kilims

Should craftsmen be considered artists? When cooking or making people laugh or cry can be an art then why is there a distinction between a craftsman and an artist?

Perhaps because they are always considered lesser children of the art world? For me every person is an artist in some way or another and anything, which is, hand made shows human creativity and imagination.

I always consider colorful kilims as beautiful artwork of artists from Afghanistan. I don’t know and do not want to know the detailed quality check and classification of these colorful rugs. For me each one is an art piece in itself.

The rustic look of kilim as compared to carpet has always been an attraction for me. The geometrical designs, which are not up to perfection, like those in carpets, add another dimension to the artistic effect of the creation. 

The colorful designs show the zest for life in deserted hills, snow clad mountains and not so desirable war beaten living conditions. I always wonder which factor motivates these artists/craftsmen to use such vibrant colors? Just a look at their work big or small makes one lively and cheerful and believe more in the possibilities and hopes of life.

And as I end this post, my daughter walks in reading her favorite quote from the Dune, “Hope clouds observation”.

Do Monkeys Have Taste Buds?

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

Finally! I have taken a much needed break from my hectic professional life which involved preparing and serving food to corporate clients while using application of science behind the age old practice of kitchen craft. My years of higher education in science were finally of some use. The chemical reactions came rushing back to my brain as I struggled to get the perfect combination of the ingredients in my pantry. Chemistry was able to explain simple theories involved in making food but the bigger question is, did my clients have even the slightest idea of the science involved? Or were they only interested in the tastes?

Despite numerous efforts, my mind refuses to change its old habit of unearthening the science behind any and everything, even the most mundane activities. It might seem like a funny topic to start a blog with, but the left lobe of my brain is pressing hard on this question.

Do monkeys have taste buds? Is that too weird of a question? I am curious to know. And I’ll tell you why. Yesterday, my balcony was hijacked by a big fat monkey who ate away all my green, raw organic tomatoes and eggplants that I had grown with great effort and a very expensive gardener, in my little terrace kitchen garden. I don’t know whether this vicious creature liked those juicy vegetables or not, but it sure wasted them all. And now I’m worried that if that fat monkey liked the taste of tomatoes, it will be back for more. Thank god I grow ginger in the adjoining pots!!! Or should I say, thank science!

Now what is the relation between monkeys and ginger’s pungent taste? And do monkeys know this relation and behave accordingly? That is again a question to ponder on.