Page 18 - Anjolie Ela Menon - Inner Vision

reference to the mother-child relationship that rarely ever any distinction between the foreground
Menon holds so dear. and background. Objects like crows perched on
fences are introduced into these landscapes to
Menon has also experimented with fine jewellery create a sense of perspective. Other objects are
making with beaded necklaces studded with seen scattered around these scenes, painted in
various gemstones, like citrine, diamonds and bright colours, and yet they lend a desolate feel.
rubies, and pendants that encase miniature The sky too would take the colours of her
paintings. Some of her muses have been her imagination rather than a realistic blue, often seen
children and grandchildren, portraits of whom in a vibrant gold or sepia tone instead.
have featured in pendants that she then later
gifted them. The influence of her family Other motifs that recur in her works are
throughout her works in all mediums has been clotheslines and charpoys. The charpoys are
evident in her oeuvre. When asked about her pictured in landscapes inspired by her travels
inspirations, the artist has said in the past, “…my through rural Kerala. Large expanses of green
amazing family, so many of whom have been fields can be seen set against the bright skies, with
great achievers, and also the impact that the cots themselves being set with a blanket and
literature, music and books have left on me. other assorted objects.
Vivekananda, Bach, Modigliani, Henry Miller,
Pudovkin, Ingmar Bergman, Satyajit Ray, Rublev, The urban landscape too has moved the artist to
Bosch, Camus, Bhimsen Joshi, Ayn Rand, create several works, with her time in Bombay and
Corbusier, DK Pattamal, and Gaugin have affected Delhi being highly influential for her. “Menon is
me profoundly at differently times of my life.” particularly distinct because she has debunked
the reigning credos of representing the
As has been made evident over the years, Menon contemporary Indian city – its areas of deeply
has experimented with various mediums, genres conflicted urbanism or the smart slick
and subjects, making sure not to be held down by representation of modernity, to revert to images of
her own cliches. She has said in the past, “I am non-space, non-time, the evocation of pastiche
neither a didactic nor narrative painter. I am hardly and cross-cultural references,“ said art curator
concerned with events, though I like to lay my and critic Gayatri Sinha about Anjolie Menon.
people bare – I like to bare them a bit beyond what
is decent, sometimes ripping open a chest to Famed for her compositions, Anjolie Ela Menon
reveal the heart beating within. Of course, there has dealt with multiple subjects combined on one
are many who have identified with the women I canvas. These works, perfected over a career
paint, especially those who are trapped or sitting spanning six decades, tell stories that have been
alone on a chair, or those innocent ones with a influenced by her laborious studies, the art that
newly-awakened sensuality, and those who are has moved her and the people and geographies
waiting.” she has encountered on her many travels. While
her practice has seen many evolutions since she
Many of her works deal with nostalgia, imagination began painting, the brooding fantastical quality
or a beautiful mix of both. Speaking of this to Asian has remained pervasive throughout. Inspired by
Age, the artist says, “Nostalgia plays a big part in the likes of Hieronymus Bosch and Modigliani, her
my oeuvre but is transmuted through the paintings combine a sense of the absurd with the
experiences and visual experiences of today’s serene. Speaking on her own evolution, she once
inspirations. Also, some of the contradictions in said to Outlook India, “As a young woman my work
impulses are deliberate. For instance, I do attempt was far more spontaneous both in conception and
in many of these works to escape the tendency to technique. I think that the fecundity of
paint pictures that are ‘too beautiful’. Aesthetics motherhood had a great effect on my work in the
have dominated my work at a time when harmony middle years - the raw emotion coalescing with
and beauty had become almost dirty words! So experience into a symbolic mode. Experiments
now, I often try to deconstruct a painting, with different media followed and I entered a more
introducing a deliberate element of disturbance.” cerebral phase with the understanding that the
Although found rarely in Anjolie Menon’s oeuvre, juxtaposition of visual images in illogical
the artist’s landscapes are unusually impactful. sequences could result in 'deconstructing' a
Often framed by windows and curtains, there is painting to achieve unusual results that 'happy
accidents' could open new vistas and that one husband’s many postings, she witnessed other
was fortunate enough to be painting in an age migrants too, who would later become subjects for
where artists had already been liberated in terms her. From the homeless to beggars to pilgrims, all
of methods and materials. Anything was now grist have been part of many of her paintings. The
for the mill of creativity.” Kumbh Mela, one of the largest pilgrimages
undertaken in the world where crores of devotees
Her repetition of motifs has grown from being gather to take a holy bath, resulted in paintings like
subjective to symbolic over time. Earlier, she was ‘Visarjan’.
heavily against being associated with symbolism,
adamant that objects used for decoration were In her own journeys to Kerala, she found
meant to be seen as just that - decoration. Some inspiration in the small town of Namboodiri priests
of her favourite motifs to return to, like goats, kites, with their threads, forehead markings and
balloons, and crows would later take on meaning traditional clothing. This would become one of her
as Menon’s personal experiences grew. With the more prominent series as it was also her first foray
birth of her two sons and as she witnessed them into subjects that were so identifiably Indian.
growing up, her works would become increasingly
peppered with symbols of their childhood, like toys Anjolie Menon has also been deeply fascinated by
and kites. Goats also hold significance for her as the subject of life and death, delving into them
she witnessed the goat herders of Nizammudin in-depth through her works. This can be witnessed
Basti in New Delhi every day as she worked in her in her artworks created after the Bangladesh war
studio. They would especially hold significance in in 1971. The massacre deeply moved the artist to
her art when she would be kept away from the create paintings featuring piles of victims of the
basti due to the pandemic, churning out many violence that occurred. Her other moving works
smaller-scale works with makeshift apparatus. post the communal violence in Gujarat in 2002
depicts infants, mothers and other helpless
The sights and sounds of the area have influenced victims in heart-wrenching scenes. ‘Tsunami’ from
many of her works - “My studio has been in the the year 2005 depicts another tragedy, with a
visually rich basti for 20 years where the woman holding her infant close, surrounded by
inhabitants, the goats, dogs and chickens, have fish.
been a part of my artworks. Crows often found
space in my works when I was in Mumbai. The
basti and the nearby dargah, regularly visited by
people of different nationalities, are a constant
source of inspiration.”
Rites of passage too would form a significant
portion of her compositions. She chronicles the
various important life events in people’s lives,
including thread ceremonies and the day of a
wedding. In the painting titled ‘Wedding Day’, the
apprehension of the bride-to-be is palpable as she
is attended by an older woman while her husband
waits for her, hidden behind the drapes. She would
also repeat the theme of women protagonists
enveloped in uncertainty in paintings like
‘Grandma Ethel Comes To Kolkata’. The central
subject is her own grandmother, a maternal figure
in her life, seen arriving in India for the first time
with her entourage in tow and being greeted by
the sights of a new country. Her travels and the
pilgrimages of others too played a large role in
influencing many of her compositions. Living a
rather transient life as she moved from one city to
another, one country to another with her
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