after visiting Ajanta and Ellora, she was amazed by their “breathtaking lyricism”.
New book ‘Amrita & Victor’ explores Sher-Gil and her unconventional relationship with her first cousin Victor Egan.
Avant-garde artist Amrita Sher-Gil believed that all art, including religious, came about because of a sensuality so great that it transcends the boundaries of the mere physical and she first experienced the rawness of art when she visited Ajanta and Ellora . says a new book.
The Indo-Hungarian painter often wondered how you can feel the beauty of form, the intensity or the subtlety of color, the quality of lines, unless you are a sensualist of the eye. But after visiting Ajanta and Ellora, she was amazed by their “breathtaking lyricism”.
She wrote to her parents that Ajanta is wonderful, according to the book “Amrita & Victor” written by Ashwini Bhatnagar. The book tells the story of Sher-Gil and her unconventional relationship with her cousin Victor Egan, whom she later married. It also delves into the captivating story of Sher-Gil, a symbolic figure who symbolized the rich cultural fusion between Hungary and India, her family, her work and her relationships with other men.
Sher-Gil explored Ellora in great detail, but aside from the structure, he was struck by the silence, says the book, published by Fingerprint! She told her sister Indira that Ellora is the “most quiet place I’ve ever experienced. One does not know what silence is, what it can be, until one has been to Ellora.”
The author also writes that Sher-Gil believed that “all art, including religious art, has come about because of sensuality so great as to transcend the bounds of the mere physical.” The book says that Sher-Gil was hypercritical of the paintings made to depict India’s earthy Indian character.
Quoting from her diary, she says: “Those so-called paintings which depict an India where the sun shines with an inevitability matched only by the mediocrity of conception and execution of that sunlight as it plays on the fresh hues of standardized grey-brown and gives the aspiring artists the chance to exploit the possibilities of orange reflected light and blue half-lights. “Those serene or sunlit landscapes with authentic Indian ‘middle-range’ ruins serve as trademarked, conclusive, irrefutable proofs of the genuineness of the item (manufactured in India), but none of the brushstrokes really convey India,” it adds.
The book was presented last month at the Embassy of Hungary by ambassador Istvan Szabo and art historian Alka Pande. Bhatnagar emphasized that the book is based on carefully documented correspondence between Amrita and Victor, vividly recording their conversations, incidents and the unfolding of their remarkable relationship.
