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Etching a different path

Dhinakara Sundar's works showcase new materials and methods in printmaking

BEYOND THE ROUTINE One of Dhinakara's works

The white walls ofAshvita emanate an aura of contemplative ambience, as the frames that grace them are abstracts with muted and meditative colours. The medium of expression is prints, but represented with a difference. Dhinakara Sundar is back after a long hiatus with his works that are again exploratory and experimental in nature. In 2003, he had introduced painting on lotus leaves, after meticulously developing a technique that would allow the leaf to hold the pigments.

In this series of works titled Mixed Media, he has harnessed new materials and methods in printmaking that have resulted in art works that are different in their aesthetics and modes of representation. What makes his works exceptional is his approach to printmaking that has ever remained a challenge, provoking him to create a different tract, despite the fact that printmaking is labour and material intensive, requiring dedicated efforts. Historically, printmaking as a medium of communication and artistic expression has been popular since the 15th Century. Names as Albrecht Durer, Rembrandt, Honore Daumier among many others are etched in our consciousness and nearer home artists as Dakshinamoorthy, R.B. Bhaskaran, Laxma Goud, Rm. Palaniappan and A. Balasubramaiam have defined their identity through this medium.

Beautiful blend

Dhinakara has yoked in materials as black glazed cardboard and gold and silver boards. Making use of Japanese rice paper that has variety of surface patterns, he has painstakingly mounted it on either gold, silver or black boards, affecting an illusion of screen print, which then serves as a surface to receive the etched print. He does not stop with the mere print transferred through the etched zinc plate rather he creatively combines it with his etchings to construct works that are a meld of printmaking, collage and linear drawings.

His abstract compositions which comprises of representations of etched plates, or palm leaf manuscripts, or gentle linear scribbles that gestalt as memory steles on which he has etched the history of his alma mater, the Madras School of Arts and Crafts; in terms of its founding year, the names of the colonial superintendents and the various principals from D.P. Roy Chowdhry to L. Munuswamy. Advancing his innovative method further, he has placed the etched zinc plate on glazed black board and with dexterous framing; has created an illusion of the etched zinc plate being mounted. This constellation of his works is impressive and dramatic.

The notion of Zen pensiveness is evident particularly in the manipulation of space. The space is made interactive through play of textures, which virtually is a staccato dance on the surface, directing the eye and gaze to probe every mark and trace left behind by his etched plate. Reinforcing these qualities are his serene colours. Though his imagery is playful here and serious elsewhere there are glimpses of Palaniappan's visual vocabulary of geometric linear configurations or the mysteries of the "space" beyond. It is therefore the key concept of space; namely the two dimensional or spiritual and not an illusion of material three dimensionality that absorbs Dhinakara. On this basic premise of exploring the formal elements, he manipulates and freely interpolates various materials, creates interesting yet tactile textures and allows the interfacing of imagery, textures and space through his selective colours. Consequently in his works the colours remain in the background and various implied and real textures become the protagonist. And all of these reflect the training of the hand and eye that Dhinakara went through in Japan (on a scholarship in 2001-02).

The show is on at Ashvita Art Objects and Artifacts till November 17.

ASHRAFI S. BHAGAT

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