Movement as design
MITA KAPUR
|
Ankit Patel's art is inspired by his rustic roots, as folk traditions and even farm equipment impact his creations.
|
Action in static sculpture: One of Ankit Patel's works.
LUMPS of clay become living moulds. Liquid plaster fills the clay; wax coats it. Brick powder protects. Fired and buried in the earth. Melted bronze is poured over it like a final ablution; it emerges the way its creator had imagined. It emerges as a sleeping watchman in weather beaten bronze. The stillness moves. There is strength in the muscles even without a ripple in the sinews. Standing far, I see Ankit Patel waiting calmly till I moved around the grace and fluidity of men and women holding hands, their faces bare, bodies eloquent. Was it the partnership of living life or simply growing together? Ankit answered, "can you think of a piece of art that changes every time you look at it ?" Kinetic Art incorporates actual movement as a part of design. Ankit's `mobiles' speak of earthy charm, emotions are let loose in fluid motions. Simplicity and Freedom are mated.
Spontaneous looks
Ankit Patel, a sculptor who has 40 years of creating motion and action in static sculpture, works with wood, bronze, stone, sensing moods, picking up primeval vibrations from life as a creative force, just lifting moments as they happen and holding them is his `cast'. The deliberate effort to make his men, women and children look spontaneous. View each piece from any angle; it is complete. A child throwing up a rope in spiralling motion or a couple who seem to be in a dance, holding back, not letting go, the conflict is apparent in the body language. No wonder Ankit's been called a working romantic.
"I create the form, keeping the material in mind. The emotions, the senses are harmonised in my mind, it takes shape with very minor changes in clay. I work on a revolving table, my spontaneity encircles the form, it develops without a break, I make it grow naturally. It's not like painting, where you can keep layering and making changes. Once I overcome the barriers the material projects, the form can't be changed."
Ankit's approach to his art took me back to my days as a Literature student, we spoke of Longfellow's Michelangelo — "the earth was moulded out of clay, and baked in fire; men, women and all animals that breathe are statues, and not paintings."
His art is not conceived in a vacuum, it's an outcome of visual imageries. The village near Surat, where he grew up, gives him most of his imagination. Simplicity comes from his rustic roots that others from urban spaces find romantic. The floating, lyrical rhythm of rural life is intensified within his mind space. Simple folk traditions, even farm equipment have become Ankit's means of creation. The rahanta — a wheel of small metal tins, moved by an ox, to draw water from a well fascinates Ankit. He immortalises the spirit and essence of his own childhood, casting memories in bronze. Men and women breaking mangoes with arms outreaching the sky, farmers wearing dirty clothes, with torn sleeves, "what they call `sleeveless' here, torn knees, what they wear as jeans today, was a part of my life already."
Freedom of movement
There are no line breaks, the faces are flat, chests are all bare, "shirts would take away the freedom of movement, `they' are born to be free." The aim is to transcribe a movement, freezing `it' in a stance that conveys mobility. Huge sculptures, up to 14 feet tall can move in lightest of breeze. Kinetic Art has been Ankit's mission statement for years. He drew from the great masters of kinetic sculpture — Marcel Duchamp, Naum Gabo, Alexander Calder. Stalwarts like Sankhoo Choudhary pushed him in this direction. He took to the motions like a fish in water. How things look when they are moving get framed in Ankit's mind. The flow is then an endless pursuit. An aura of serenity surrounds the shapes, as if in sync with a living pulse. Earthly charm and quietude, a will to exist `just like this' comes from all his forms. "This comes from being peaceful, I have no mood problems, no disturbances, no mobiles ringing. I'm friends with solitude." Fashion TV is a hit with him, "helps me understand body language well".
"My village, Motavrachh, on the Tapti where I slept under open skies, where I absorbed and observed all our life's tools in 3D. My freedom here and the freedom to experiment that was given to me by my teacher, Mahendra Pandya, led me to kinetic sculpture. If a motor cycle repairer can repair a car, why can't we also be as experimental and adventurous? There is art in everything around us. What I make should last for thousands of years."
Dance of life
"Installation Art subsuming sculpture doesn't bother me. There has to be a permanency in the materials used and forms created. Senior artists who can afford to experiment get into Installation Art. Or it's students who are in the throes of learning. And anyway, the art mart trends in India today show that only the commercially smart artists make it big." Ankit is rooted in his rustic roots, his art, his life is synonymous with his creations. It begins and ends with that. Taking his sculptures to Mumbai and Paris, he plans to scale the globe eventually. Who knows, we'll see Parisian flavours in his kinetic forms, moving in beat with their dance of life?
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Magazine
