Music and painting coverage at Maihar 2006

The Maihar gharana recently came alive with an exhibition showcasing a vibrant and divergent flow of ideas in creativity where the works conceived and developed during the 2006 Maihar Workshop throbbed with life.

The name of 'Maihar' is quite familiar in the arena of Indian classical music and is integrally associated with Ustad Allaudin Khan, a legendary name in this field. This great figure had produced much-acclaimed names like Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, Annapurna Devi, Pandit Ravi Shankar and Nikhil Banerjee.

Maihar had been the venue of an annual art workshop, organised by Gallery Sanskriti, providing opportunities for creative and social interaction among some of the country's finest contemporary artists in an ambient atmosphere.

The GSM 2006 workshop showcased veteran artists from Kolkata like Shuvaprasanna, Ashoke Mullick, Lalu Prasad Shaw, Suhas Roy, Dipali Bhattacharya and Shipra Bhattacharya. It brought together even six budding artists from Mumbai - Sanjay Sawant, Vanita Gupta, Ashutosh Apte, Rajshree, Prakash Waghmare and Satish Wavabre.

The medium that most of the artists opted for, included paintings like conti on paper, oil on canvas, acrylic on wood and canvas, water colour on paper and mixed media.

Ambica Beri of Gallery Sanskriti told UNI, ''The Maihar workshop was not just an esoteric experiment, it was also firmly grounded on stark realities.'' ''With industrialisation and the exploitation of mineral resources creating havoc with the once green landscape of the town and its surroundings, it set the tone for a dialogue with environmental activists campaigning for restoration of dicused quaries,'' she opined.

One of the artists, Shipra Bhattacharya, said, '' Maihar is one of my favourite get-aways where one can work undisturbed. '' Asked about whether their paintings carry any theme, the artists said, ''Art has its own theme and can go beyond boundaries undefined.'' The exhibition saw dignified visitors like Amla Shankar, wife of late Uday Shankar and their daughter-in-law Tanushree Shankar.

Appreciating the gallery, Amla Shankar remarked, ''You see it (artistic paintings) and it talks to you. It has its own language to convey its message to you.'' The workshop, however, was a convergence of creative ideas and potentials in a loose, quietly structured and sustaining environment. It afforded a glimpse into how art and artists can engage themselves in an organic two-way passage with a place and a community.