Manisha Baswani

What is your earliest memory as an artist?
I don t remember when I picked up the brush and began painting. The credit should go to my parents. Apparently, I used to love sketching on the walls, like all children do. Instead of discouraging me, they stuck sheets of paper on arm length so that I could continue scribbling. On completing school, I joined the Art Department of the Jamia Milia University and under...

What is your earliest memory as an artist?
I don t remember when I picked up the brush and began painting. The credit should go to my parents. Apparently, I used to love sketching on the walls, like all children do. Instead of discouraging me, they stuck sheets of paper on arm length so that I could continue scribbling. On completing school, I joined the Art Department of the Jamia Milia University and under painter and muralist A. Ramchandran, studied Indian murals and miniature paintings.

What would you consider the turning point in your artistic career?
I think my trip to Paris. I was 26, young and for the first time independent in what is considered the city of art. When I came back to India I did a series of post Paris work, that had nostalgia for Paris. After that I began working for the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts in New Delhi, headed by Kapila Vatsayan. Let me mention here that I am inspired by the French artist Matiesse, who himself is inspired by Indian miniatures, so it was like coming back full circle. At IGNC, I was working on a multi media project about the influences of Geet Govind ---- the 13th century poem written by Jayadev --- on various art forms like dance, drama and literature.
This Sanskrit epic had far-reaching influence on practically all art forms in India, Xerox, Palo Alto, U.S., provided the technological and financial support for this project. We contemporarised Indian icons like the dhol (a precussion instrument), or a pundit(priest) for an American audience, and that s when Indian icons caught my fancy.
I think I would consider that the turning point in my career. I understood the work of my guru A. Ramchandran much better.

You used to work in oil, but then you changed to watercolours. why?
Yes, I presently work with watercolours and gouache. Although earlier I worked with the large format, now my paintings are in the small format. I have moved towards the miniature format because I work from home since I have a small baby.
Also, I realised that oil and turpentine was affecting my child s health so I moved towards watercolours.
Working from home forced me to decrease the format to miniatures, really.

What were the challenges involved in a shift from large canvasses to miniatures?
Well, the format is totally different, and miniatures are much more detailed, unlike say a large canvas.Usually gouache is a medium that does not permit easy layering --- it took me eight years to master the process and gouache at last responded to me. Also, though the form is Indian miniature, the kinds found in Udaipur in Rajasthan, where there is a flat use of space, the content is contemporary. I am 32 now and have grown up with James Bond and Elvis Prestly and a lot of modern, pop images. I use these images, a lot of kitsch elements in my work. I use a lot of MTV visuals and images from cinema.
The colours I use are very bright, oranges, reds, blues, colours found in street art. I think that's the essence of India: in one space you will see a beautiful modern shop, and next to it an old one with a very ancient fan whirring on the ceiling.

And then came your Ladakh inspired series?
Yes, that was after I travelled extensively in Ladakh. It brought culture alive for me. Monasteries and homes in Ladakh are covered, wall to floor, with intricate paintings. They are most beautiful because that is an alive tradition. On the way to monasteries we see monks praying. It was like seeing the culture that you had read about and visualised come alive for you. Buddhism is a practising religion around which the works of art revolve.
I witnessed the ceremonies - monks chanting - and this was a culture so deep and the experience so unusual that I returned and produced a series of works on Ladakh, and Ladakh continued to keep coming into my work for a long time. My first solo show was inspired by the Ladakh images.

What would you consider your inspirations?
The everyday images. An artist is a visual person and reacts visually to everything around. They translate everything they see onto the canvas. I think over the last few years, a lot of imagery from the young media has seeped into my work.
I have also been influenced by the patta chitras of Orissa and West Bengal, Madhubani paintings (folk paintings from Madhya Pradesh and Bihar) and Rajasthani miniatures. As we discussed earlier, Buddhist murals, especially the ones at Ladakh, and the Kerala murals have also seeped in my imagery as sources of inspiration.
In the miniature and mural paintings, it is features like the use of color symbolism, of flora, space division and abstracting the idea central to the theme that interests me a great deal. And it is to use them in a contemporary context in my creative visual expression that has been my fascination and focus.
In the recent past, I have moved towards depicting kitsch elements. We see a lot of it in the colorful Indian environment as on the streets, in shops, roadside dhabas (eateries), middle class homes, and these days through music channels on television.

What are you working on now?
Now is my Elvis phase and I am making a series of paintings revolving around pop icons.