Green color and a strange script’s swaths shared you on shared echo, and now you gaze on those fonts, the more you are seeing them before. Familiar, and yet the new, raw and original hand seems to be a cross between calligraphy, calligraphy and close an ancient manuscript.
Shared Eco, Amitabh Sengupta’s exhibition, shows its art works from the forest and inscription series. A close look at its canvas, especially in the inscription chain, manifests far more than before meeting with the eyes. The one series acts as a shocking reminder of a world where the green cover is rapidly decreasing.
Life and culture
Amitabh says that he did not have a permanent address for the longest period of time, while traveling outside the country to study in Paris and later Nigeria, where he worked for 11 years, after which he moved to the United States for higher studies. “This experienced side of my life and continuously moving forward are reflected in my art. People, culture and landscape – rainforest, dry desert and metropolitan cities – all served to inspire me.”
The 84-year-old artist says, “Cultures and languages ​​are different, and people respond differently. These experiences and realities have revealed in subjects, colors and my style over the years.”
Amitabh Sengupta | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
While almost each of his trips has inspired a series, Amitabh says that a continuity has been the presence of the course. “The inscription series seems to be the longest lasting, and it is almost merged with all my other series,” they say.
The artist reaches the depth in the stability of the word written and permanent flexibility. “A city walls are mirrors of their lives with social and political slogans, protests and cinema posters, which reflects its nature. And while, every city has its own pattern of life, appears through writing in public places.”
He explains how he saw inscriptions on historical artifacts. “They were not always religious in nature. Sometimes it would be a dedication to the selfless work of a ruler or a citizen. They must have broken the walls and uprooted the stones, but the interaction they did despite the passage of time still remained. It is more than the information that offered those pieces.”
Amitabh shared how he came in a book on the history of the script around that time. “Cave art was the way of communication of man. It was not about creating or catching beauty, but wanted to say anything; they were the beginning of a script, symbolic early pictures or scratches.”
With the echo shared by Amitabh Sengupta. Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Art and script
Saying that, Amitabh explained how art and script make a parallel purpose. According to him, as scripts developed, words became, which created sentences and meaning. “In this way, man’s expressions who were initially oral, became silent and got depth by the ability to be written and expanded through time and place.”
He says how some ancient inscriptions still keep mankind in their throw, especially the Indus script that remains unspecified. “This line of thought did not end me and I started studying symbolism in other cultures along with various scripts like Pali, Brahmi and Chinese.”
“Each script itself is beautiful, complex and complete. You can place it on a chair or frame it. Not only the phrase or a word; each original character is the form of a complete aesthetics.”
Script and man
It is not surprising that Amitabh prepared his script, whose characters are seen in the inscription series.
He says that in the 90s he used some characters of the Brahmi script in some time, which were on one of his canvas. The artist says, “I used brass and black bold colors, and although it was an alphabet, it was a form – like a tree or human figure. What started on the idea of ​​creating my script,” the artist says.
“Finally, they became a symbolic essence with colors, lines and textures. As they are the construction of my own construction, they have no historical reference and do not mean to read or understand. They are abstract, universal and timeless.”
With the echo shared by Amitabh Sengupta. Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Their attraction seems infinite, which is remarkable given his age. He continues, “Even today, how do we explain that the script has developed, how we write.
NGMA
In addition to the show in gallery time and space, Amitabh is running at the National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA) in a rebel city on Amitabh.
He said, “I have around 134 tasks on performance in NGMA – from my early students days in Paris, from Delhi and Nigerian periods, as well as later Indian periods,” they say, it spreads their entire aure.
“Some of my idols are also shown in the retrospective, which gives an idea of ​​styles, techniques and media that I have employed for years. My work in the show can give an idea of ​​my nature.”
By May 18, 2025, there will be echo shared at the time of gallery and location. Entry free. Monday closed.
Published – May 12, 2025 10:21 AM IST
