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INDIAN SURREALISM |
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Perhaps ‘over’ and ‘above’ are the equivalence to the French word Sur. As a prefix to the word ‘real’ it means something that stays put above reality. New words are coined to carry concepts when the existing vocabulary seems inadequate. That was the reason why Guillaume Apollinaire had coined the word ‘Surreal’ in the prefatory note to his play ‘the Breast of Tiresia in 1917, as an adjective, to express a state of erotic phantasm. The word caught the fancy of Andre Breton in 1924 to name a literary movement to express the state of mind when Europe was experiencing the crisis of existing socio-cultural values. He based his movement on Sigmund Freud’s theory of dream, unconscious and libido, and their interplay in literature. His concept permeated the realms of visual and performing arts and became an international movement in Europe’s geo- political context. Breton had formulated certain cut and dried means and characteristics of Surrealism and the movement evolved around his didactic manifesto. To a surrealist the span between the two world wars appeared to be the time of helplessness and delusion. The art they turned out betrayed a total disenchantment with the conventional values of life and a disregard for all the signifiers of traditional values. The literal meaning of the word that Apollinaire thought about had been replaced by Breton with his interpretative meaning that became absolute over the years, as a noun. If we set aside the meaning of Surreal that has been established through usage and go back to its explicit meaning, we shall find an approximation of the meaning in the Indian concepts of Alaukika and Chamatkara. Alaukika means art’s capacity to transcend objective figuration into a subjective state of enjoyment unrelated to physical pain or pleasure and self - interest. Chamatkara relates to the concept of Apurva or an unprecedented image in art. If reality signifies the objective things that pervade our visual range, then going beyond this objectivity would mean imagining something Apurva or surreal which refers to nothing but itself. What we call reality is always in a state of flux and transitory in nature. Chamatkara means the magical propensity of line and color, stone and metal, that attains shape hereto before unseen in art. Surrealism in its explicit meaning is inherent in Indian Art. The absence of chiaroscuro, the rhythmic transformation of the image, the subjective use of colour et al are the surreal elements that gave Indian art a character of its own beyond the didactive norms of the European Surrealism. This exhibition has been envisaged to display the fact that despite stylistic pluralism, the Indian artists’ forte remains their imaginative faculty that verges on both the Alaukika and Chamatkara concepts – hence surreal in nature, without any external indoctrination. The four armed Nataraja’s Ananda tandava posture is an instance of both Alaukika and Chamatkara that shows axiomatic imaginative faculty and the creative bravura. The surreal arms of Nataraja discharge a kinetic rhythm and make the dancing stances explicit with a harmony and balance. The cosmic dance that celebrates the immutability of life over death, is not unreal but very much surreal in its true meaning. That was the reason why it amazed August Rodin who considered this surreal element as a superb expression of the idea inherent in the image. According to the Indian psyche creation in art does not mean a copy of the external world, but an enrichment of the artistic image with the contributions of the mind that sees beyond physical reality and ushers in images which would have remained unseen but for art. Prof.(Dr) Sovon Som
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