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Blending imagination with reality

Joya Shahrin's exhibition of prints

Fayza Haq
linages of humans, flowers and animals are to be found in Joya Shahrin Huq's prints and mixed media in her exhibition, "With my imagination", which opened recently at ShUpangan. Having done her masters in prints from Baroda, Joya now teaches part time at the Institute of Fine Arts. DU.
Joya went into print-making as she wanted to do something different from the usual routine of oils, brushes and easels, as she puts it. Learning from her teachers Safiuddin Ahmed and Mohammed Kibria, Joya has used mostly black, grey and sepia. "1 like black and white prints and find the combination rich. Black and white prints go back to classical days of Rembrandt, Durer and Goya.
"In my choice of subjects, I've taken the life of humans, birds and animals. I deal with hunger, greed, anger, peaceful dispositions and other emotions in living beings. My lizards, wolves, eagles, butterflies and flowers are all used as symbols. Just as the wolf stands for violence and anger so the butterflies and flowers stand for happiness and goodness," says Joya. Sometimes she works spontaneously on the zinc plate and at other times, she makes a sketch before she goes to make the print. She tries to bring in her surroundings along with some elements of her imagination.
In one of the prints, we see her portrait in the centre. On one side is a large, fleshy water lily, with a "borak" (a creature with legs of a
horse, wings of an eagle and head of a woman) at the other end. The "borak" is to lend a spiritual flavour, and the portrait is to provide a personal touch.
In another print we find a seated woman with the backdrop of large, exotic flowers. Lizards, shadows, and circles standing for life decorate a seated nude in the next print. This too is in black, white and sepia. The wolf is brought in many of the pieces, and it stands for strength. The portrait of an American art historian sees a variation of the use of orange hues. In her installation, Joya has used innumerable such portraits, in minimal colours.
In one of her series Joya has used chairs of different shapes and sizes, symbolising power. She has combined them with images of frisky, black cats. "All around us we see the struggle for power, whether it be the nation's politics or the tussle between a mother in-law and the daughter in-law," says Joya. Some of her work had used photo-transfer on to zinc plates, when she made compositions with portraits of her friends in her student days in Baroda.
It is not easy for Joya to transfer her emotions on to her paper as she does not want to present mere illustrations. Working with acid on the zinc plates is also risky, as the artist points out.
Apart from senior artists, Joya has been taught by Mahmudul Haque, Abul Barq Alvi, and Rokeya Sultana in Dhaka. In Baroda, she had Pedi Dhumal, Bcjai Bagori and Jai Kumar as her guides.