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Bovine power
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The bovine form has been explored through paint, metal and stone in “The Bovine Principle”
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Suggestive figuration One of the works on show
In the same gallery space that housed his “Bull and Beyond” exhibition in 1998, Chennai-based artist A.V. Ilango has chosen to present, what may be viewed as a continuation of the same theme, “The Bovine Principle”. Elaboratin
g on the inspiration that has remained with him through the years, he has explored the bovine form through paint, stone and metal.
Juxtaposed with his acrylic paintings are his stone and metal sculptures, which assume three-dimensional forms that seem to be derived from the flat plane of the canvas. The flat forms have ostensibly jumped off the canvas to take shape in the round. The positive and negative spaces that are characteristic of his paintings extend into the sculptural mode allowing the mind’s eye to formulate the bovine form in its entirety. Shapes and lines dance and intermingle sensuously teasing the viewer into piecing together the artist’s suggestive figuration.
Dualism is an enduring concept that underwrites his works, be they in two-or three-dimensional media; this is evident in his transpositions of solids and voids, free-flowing calligraphic lines and structured forms, rough matt and polished reflective surfaces, Shiva and Shakthi, the real and the mythological. Structured compositions that are seemingly weighty with heavy paint strokes and bold colours are balanced by canvases that are made airy by lyrical, uninhibited lines — sometimes elevating the heavy form of the bull with the agility of a dancer. An attention-grabbing adaptation of the prancing bull with its hind legs kicking in the air is a sculptural form created using metal coat hangers held together with copper wire.
While the artist appears to be moving away from literal representation towards abstraction, he constantly acknowledges the presence of the bodily form of the bull. The power of suggestion is plainly evident in “Soaking” where, by using minimalist renditions in figuration, Ilango allows the viewer to assume the presence of the bull in a water body, merely by portraying two small projections on a base of highly polished stone. The viewer is gratified in recognising the image as that of a bull, with its head and rump breaking the surface of the water.
The strength and vitality of Ilango’s works are in keeping with the nature of the animal he seeks to portray. As an artist who has always reached within for inspiration, to his roots, his upbringing and his immediate environs, his paintings and sculptures situate themselves in the familiar. Perhaps it this ability to comprehend that makes his work easily accessible to the viewer.
“The Bovine Principle’ is on till March 14 at the Forum Art Gallery, Fifth Street, Padmanabha Nagar, Adyar.
SWAPNA SATHISH
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