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Mingling Memories with Desire

by Fayza Haq
WELL-read and certainly widely experienced Abdus Sattar charmed and dazzled his viewers with his solo show at Divine Arts Gallery Water colour, crayon, collage and other media had subtly and selectively been used to channelize a harmonious display of 32 works.
Sattar's pan de n-SKanee was Burp ' showing two larger than life size ugly insects getting at each other, and next state mating each other. The two gobrc-pokaguki were chasing each other around like some maddened gladiators.
This woodcut was balanced by representatyms of cattle head and deer-head. The latter although they brought tn the reality had more of a decorative effect. Heid IT and Head III' were being exhibited at the same time in countries like Japan. Due to pressure of work load and other economic factors the artist s vibrancy and immediacy of the subject petered into something orna mental, although one knows Sattar too well to sink in this morass. This, incidentally, was the only possible com paratively apparent mire in which the artist has ever known to have bogged down to, as far as I can recollect in the past two decades. The style of attracting viewers with visual techniques such as mingling shades of intensity of the black was found in both these pieces, as the shade of nod receded to the bottom of the two graphic entries.
The deer appeared to be chewing some leaves and atop the cows head was a bird, which could have been a crow or a phinge, eating away at the ticks and other worms in the creature's body The paisley pattern above the defers head continued on to the images that stood for eyes.
Nature Nodi', was a collage with the famous Smriri Saudha of Savar blending in with the element of concern for the future seen by the blind justice symbol of a delectable woman with weighing scales. The good and baa elements of nature like owls, bugs were brought in. So were unavoidable remnants and proof of the Liberation War, such as the skulls-in the forefront. Despite the combinations of numerous colours like . blue, carmine and yellow ochre, the final impact carried a buoyant pastel effect. The figures, rendered in the oriental art manner, brought in the traditional past of Bangladesh luxtaposed against deep seated hopes and aspirations for the recent past "Since 1 teach and paint alongwise, my habit of driving home a mes sage enters into my work as well," the artist commented on his own work "I did it in two days but could well have stretched it on to like But due to pressure of demand I limited the time that I allot ted to this piece," Sattar added The artist is keen on earticipating in various exhi-itions being simultaneously held in different countries, and admits that for this pur pose the print medium is the simplest answer to his needs
There is an impression of a window in Behind the Window' Collage, print and various other techniques had been utilized in this. Large dreamy eyes, thick lips and the decorative blouse of the
woman are captured in the piece with deft strokes. This was basically somewhat dark in shadfes, highlighted with white lines, and touched spar ingly with pinks and oranges. The poems, taken from a Bangla newspaper added to the intensity of the soul pitch of the artist.
'Women and Nature' followed a theme that is dear to the hearts of many artists universally. There are three somewhat similar looking women seen from the back. It is only the hairstyle, the or naments and the number of birds that surround them that distinguishes one from the others. "A single seated woman's figure would not have pleased me from thatz particular angle of vision. The repetition adds the visual sat istaefion and also the theme,” ■fhe artist said
There was a difference in the hues used for the delin eation so that the woman on the right was darker than the woman on the far left. The figures were as voluptuous and statuesque as the ones
formed in the Ajanta and El-lora caves. The roots of the siftrounding trees had embed ded themselves into the body of the women. This had been done so carefully that one could hardly perceive it at the outset. "Nature and women are symbols of btauty in our lives and so one goes with another,” Sattar added.
Circular pieces of pho tographs of details of architec ture had been cut and pasted on paper and then outlined in oil-colours in ’Memory’. These had been taken from the reliefs of Rajshahi Puthia Rajbari. In this, as was obvious, the artist wished to rejuvenate the common interest in our highly sophisticated past, which one tends ?o overlook or forget or even push aside in one's desperate bid to participate in the rapidly gaining momentum of modernisation. The terra-cotta details had been highlighted brought in men, women, animals like elephants and horses, birds, geometrical and floral patterns to please any lover of archaeology The eighteen
pieces on paper were simply absorbing.
The inevitable bond between the mother and child another well-loved age-old theme, was to be seen in Affection'. Sattar insisted that the strokes of oriental art found in it belonged more to the Bengal school rather than the Moghul school, even though there was a clear combination of both. The child's face could be seen as a Bengali one while the woman's was clearly more or nate and tradition-bound, ar resting as it was to its last de tail Nature, alongwith mankind, was seen with dot ing eyes The girl child and her mother were done in soft water-colour- washes The painting was like some romantic whisper transformed into pinks and purples.
'Composition VITT had a heart shape with two figures behind it. Different types of paints including oil and pastel had been utilised to get a 3-D effect. Naive style of drawing had been brought in with touches of pink and orange The heart had been linked by an arch which the artist be lieved was "powerful" as re gards building constructions, although he admits that it is less in vogue today. There was variation m the form of collage The heart form had been brought in as a focal point as the artist felt that it was through our feelings that we assessed "the good, the bad and the ugly" in life
A large sunflower with its leaves had been sketched in 'Sunflower' had been alone once again in the naive style It had perhaps Van Gogh's Sunflower' in mind. The background had crimson and yellow dots for balance of composition. The flower was meant to be a symbol of the agonies and ecstasies of life.
Sattar believes that his art expresses emotions, apprehensions and institutions. There is also self-expression and" insight. The basic emotions joy, sorrow, anger and fear get priority in his work.
Sattar — who believes, like most other artists, that participation of our artists in over seas exhibitions and in local biennials have improved their style and thought content — has participated in 19 foreign exhibitions in places like USA, Europe, Canada, Japan etc. He has won three gold medals and seven other prestigious awards and grants. At* present he heads the Oriental section at the Institute of Fine Arts. DU