"When lines go for a walk - Artscape of a painter" / Ravindra Salve
- by Gautam Chatterjee, senior art connoisseur
Paul Klee used to say, ‘my lines go for a walk’. In Indian cultural milieu, it is rare to find walking lines after the era of Abanindranath Thakur. After a long melancholic gap, I witnessed such lines as the reflections of white soul where resides the white bird trying to fly in a white sky.
This is the entire creative canvas of Ravindra Salve, a young and intuitive poet of painting who loves to be pure in his log-in lines.
His canvas is wide, comprises the horizons of white shadows of excruciating pain and its silhouette reliefs. His subconscious metaphors are fables of love, un-experienced and un-manifested. This invisible charm is conspicuously visible in all his drawings, sketches, paintings and even in his frozen-dance-like sculptures. He uses mnemonic words from his pleasant memory in his colours to re-absorb all hearts from the watching/moving eyes.
Graduated in drawing, painting, sculpture and modelling from Sir J. J. School of Art, Mumbai, Ravindra likes to be an offspring of the basic teachings of this school. As his drawings reflect the standard nuances of this school, one must recollect that this institution has been evolved in drawing first with the dedication of John Griffiths, the then principal of this school. This school of drawing was quite different to the Bengal school of art in mid ninetieth century. Here, even in Ravindra’s drawings, one can easily find the depth of intricacy in carving curves with transparent gallery of white space, unlike Bengal school. Walking mood is here.
If one comes across his lengthy list of solo and group exhibitions, smiled in different prestigious art galleries, one can trace in comfort that his walking mood is aesthetically prolific. Human faces are ancient, typical, mythological and a bit mongoloid. Neither colours nor the minds are anaemic, on the contrary, figures offer a touch of bright heart encapsulated in a dew-like dream in tranquillity. Mythic characters invite viewers to be sahridaya with the presence of light. Even black thick lines of anatomical animals are so lively that one becomes automatically a sahridaya, the aesthete.
The viewer as well as art connoisseur attains the same feeling with his paintings. It says, no wisdom exists like silence. Almost all eyes are closed here to portray the devotional amygdale of eastern human tradition from time immemorial. Here one can assert for the beautiful attributes from folk and regional traditions likewise Rajasthan and other artscapes rendering the musical notes of medieval historic abstraction. These are the images from the unmanifest. Ravindra seems to depict what people can not perceive through their ordinary or immediate eye, but like to witness the beauty behind the curtain. It is revealed here. Before that it was veiled by the creator himself ontologically. Ravindra does not follow his own presupposes. He feels, the background should be foreground. He believes, love finds its own way towards creation. He rests, when his lines go for a walk.
His collection is fabulous. He is rich in this sense he can offer any treasure from the white clouds of his intimate home. He intimates art lovers about his labyrinth of sound memory dissolved in his sculptures. I find Pratyabhigyan (re-cognition) in all his human and animated brains engulfed in meditated skulls. The cerebral silence is again here to make you speechless. Here meaning is inherent, and carving in immanent. They inspire that which is sacred within. They are quite reluctant to walk further.
Though Ravindra shuts his eyes in order to see, I open my heart in order to contemplate on these artbeats. Creative wishes…
Awards
2002 - AIFACS, New Delhi.
1994, 90, 83, 82 - Bombay Art Society.
1993, 82, 81 - Maharashtra State Award.
1984, 83, 82, 81 - Sir J.J. School of Arts Annual Exhibition.
Solo Shows
Jehangir art gallery1983,86,90,92,94,97,99,2003,08, 13
Art point Mumbai-2008
Kamal nayan Bajaj art gallery-1991
Son- et- lumiere, mumbai-1999
Himalaya art side Mumbai- 2001
Group Shows
2008,03,86,84,83 - Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai.
1997, 91 - Artist Centre, Mumbai.
1996 - Kala Academy, Goa.
1995 - 'Art for Hope' for cancer auction and exhibition at Windsor Manor, Banglore.
1991 - BBL Bank Antwerpen, Belgium.
50yr of independence organised by Bombay art society at jehangir art gallery-1998
Art show organized by NGMA Mumbai for Gujarat relief fund- 2000
Art fusion show at Nehru centre Mumbai- 2006,09
Harmony show at Nehru centre organised by tina ambani- 2006
Lalit kala academy new delhi- 2006
Beyond boundaries at lokayata new delhi -2006
Together art group show at jehangir art gallery mumbai-2006
Art show organised by art gallery pune at Singapore- 2006
Indian contemporary art at Syria- 2006
Indian contemporary art at Nicosia Cyprus.
Art point gallery, Mumbai- 2007
Contemporary art show organised by time and space gallery, Bangalore- 2009
Samokal art gallery, Kolkata- 2007
Maharashtra golden jubilee year at NCPA Mumbai by lalit kala academy new delhi- 2010
Art show by naag foundation at ishanya, pune- 2010
Together group art show at new delhi- 2010
Youth eye art exhibition at jehangir art gallery, Mumbai-2010
51st A Group exhibition at lalit kala academy new delhi- 2011
Group show at museum art gallery, mumbai -2011
Group show at bhuvneshwar regional centre- 2011, 12
Group show at surya hotel new delhi- 2011
Group show at ahemdabad-2011
Group show at lalit hotel new delhi- 2011
Group show venkatappa art gallery Bangalore – 2012
Group exhibition at indian habitat center new delhi-2012
Group exhibition at dubai-2012
Group show at g art gallery new delhi- 2012
Group show visual palm court gallery, Indian habitat centre- 2012
Other Participation
Participated in many National Art Exhibition organized by Lalit Kala Academy, New Delhi.
Participated in many All India Art Exhibition and many State and Regional Exhibitions.
And also participated in Art Summit, New Delhi 2012 and Art Summit at Chennai 2011.
General electrical company U.S.A chose a painting for their calander which carried the work of artist like Edward Munch and George Braque.
Honor Awards
Elected member of Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi - 2 times.
Elected member Bombay Art Society, Mumbai.
Elected member Artist Center, Mumbai.
Jury member Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai.
Member North Zone Cultural Center, Nagpur.
Collections
His art works are held proudly by Collectors all over the World, including the whos who of the Indian Business, Cultural and Political members.
Art Workshop
Bombay art society’s centenary year camp Mumbai 1988, artist centre camp 1991,2001, art trend by nag foundationpune and lalit kala academy delhi 1993, 50yrs of independence organised by AIFACS new delhi1997, terracotta camp organised by south central zone cultural centre 2001, painting camp kala academy goa 2001, interactive camp, son- et- lumiere Mumbai 2001, painting camp of SAARC countries held at Hyderabad 2005, all india painting camp at juhu hotel Mumbai 2005 painting camp at manipal mangalore 2009, painting camp at kochi organised by state lalit kala academy, painting camp at baroge himachal Pradesh 2007, painting camp at Nagpur 2008, all india painters camp by M.P tourism at mandu 2009, all india painting camp at mysore2009, all india camp art and industry organised by Tata steel at Jamshedpur 2011, 12 and Raipur 2011, all india painting camp, banglore 2011 all india painting camp bhuvneshwar 2011-12, painting camp at jammu organised by jammu police 2011.all india painting camp Raipur 2012,all india painting camp at swaswara Karnataka 2011.
Others
MURALS
H.D.F.C Mumbai, anant theatre jodhpur, radhakrishna theatre ichalkaranji hotel garden court- Mumbai, kishandas hospital Mumbai, hotel venue- Mumbai
ajinkaya holiday resort- pune, kishore bajaj farmhouse karjat, matoshri, vridhaashram Amravati, avinash bhonsle construction- pune, bal gram panvel.