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Artistic genius remembered

Bengal Gallery celebrates Safiuddin's birthday

Fayza Haq
Speaking at the Bengal Gallery on the occasion of Safiuddin Ahmed's birth anniversary on June 21, Rafiqun Nabi said that he clearly recalled when as the class teacher, the Shilpaguru told him "Not to be enticed by women." He spoke of the time when as a class five student, he saw Safiuddin's paintings of Santals, along with Zainul Abedin's portrayal of the gypsies at Bardhaman House (presently The Bangla Academy). He was won over by Safiuddin since then. He also harked back to when Safiuddin first came as the teacher, immaculately dressed, walking with a British umbrella.
Nabi said that Safiuddin liked clean work. When his house was flooded in Shamibagh, he painted the cruel onslaught of the raging waters. When Nabi was a teacher himself, he found that his teacher used to visit his father. Incidentally, he said, Qayyum Chowdhury, Safiduddin and he had a hobby to collect records and they vied each other to be the first to buy a particular record. Their tastes varied from Paul Robson to Nat King Cole and Frank Sinatra. When Pink Floyd, the Beatles, Shadows, and Bob Dylan were the rage, they raced each other to be the first to buy the latest hit record. This was not to say that Mozart or Tchaikovsky was left out. Local songs like that of Farida Parveen were among the favourites, as was Neil Diamond.
The Shilpaguru also felt keenly about politics, although he did not express his feelings in Dhaka. Safiuddin was keenly aware of the political convulsions in the country. At the same time, it was important for him to save the work of his contemporaries, like Mukul Dey and Abdul Moin, whom one can find in Ahmed Nazir's "Tribute to his Father" at Gallery Chitrak. His own contemporaries were Zainul Abedin and Qamrul Hasan. It was marvelous how he preserved the work of his friends of the '30s and '40s. With time, his work changed; he spent his own money to study in
UK. He loved Heyter's work and his own work was influenced by the light and shade work of Vermeer and Whistler. Kandinsky's forms and composition also inspired him. He was one of the first in Bangladesh to appreciate Braque, Picasso, and their Cubism. He loved blue and yellow ochre.
It was when he broke his knee in Shamibagh that he stopped working. Yet what he left behind was more than enough in itself, for others to learn from.
Bengal Foundation Chairman Abul Khair attended the discussion, along with eminent writer and journalist Abul Mansur, who had cast aside apprehensions about flying in bad weather and come from Chittagong for the occasion. He spoke of how Subir Chowdhury - who is an integral part of Bengal Gallery, had great admiration for Safiuddin. It was he who helped bring out his hard cover book and arranged programmes his birthdays. Along with Zainul Abedin, Qamrul
Hassan and SM Sultan, Shilpaguru formed a group that had the courage to leave the safety of Kolkata and to move to East Bengal, which was rather underdeveloped in 1947, when the Partition took place.
Along with Murtaza Baseer and Rashid Chowdhury, Safiuddin too moved towards abstraction. He went outside the influence of folk art, impressionism etc. He was simultaneously a teacher, a skilled worker of prints and a painter of repute, said Abul Mansur. In fact he was a master of printmaking, Mansur added.
Luva Nahid Chowdhury, Director, Bengal Foundation said that while he was alive, Safiuddin had always been at the important functions of Bengal Gallery. In 2012, Bengal Foundation started the printmaking studio in his name, she added. Luva Nahid Chowdhury promised that there would be a six-month course for the young aficionados of Safiuddin within a year.