Friday, October 12, 2018
Hyderabad-Bombay
Khuda Hafiz Hyderabad, Namaste (Again) Bombay! Attending Retrospective Exhibition on Artist M.V. Dhurandhar
Namaste from Bombay! As Arnold Schwarzenegger would say, "I'm Back!" (in Bombay).
My day began at 5.30 am in Hyderabad when I set my alarm to be woken up in my suite at the Guest House at what is usually referred to as MANUU (Maulana Azad National Urdu University). It had been a splendid conference jointly organized by Cesurae of Calcutta, Osmania University in Hyderabad and MANUU (which had provided space including housing accommodation) and had seen many participants from Hyderabad's prestigious EFLU (English and Foreign Languages University (formerly known as the CIEFL).
I had some difficulty with my Uber order as my driver called at 5.45 am to say that he did not know where the pick-up point was and I could not direct him to the University Guest House. I ended up getting a ride-share with Ashish Sen, a musician from Calcutta (now based in Bhopal) who was also heading for a 9.00 am flight to Bombay. I had a very interesting conversation with him en route to the airport. In the process, I learned a great deal about druppad--a very ancient form of Indian classical singing that is clearly an acquired taste. He lamented the lack of audience interest in this vocal form and the fact that lack of commercial possibilities make it impossible to lure newer singers to the field. In Bhopal, however, where he works, there is a music school, fully-financed by the Indian government that offers scholarships to budding Indian musicians who wish to train in the singing of druppad. Sadly, he said, after graduation, the need to make a living propels them all into the Bollywood genre of singing--which further sounds the death knell for his kind of music.
At Hyderabad Airport and Flight to Bombay:
Hyderabad International Airport is named after Rajiv Gandhi. It is so gorgeous that I could well be in any global city--it is that swanky. It is also filled with the kind of stores one might see at any international airport--Puma, Samsonite, Swarovski, etc. Further beyond are the Indian stores (The Chennai Silks, The Bombay Store, etc). There is also a wonderful Food court and since I was still on an empty stomach, I had a Mango Lassi (for Rs. 100) that was served in a paper cup! I should have had idlis or dosas--a proper South Indian breakfast. But I was too busy buying Hyderabad's famous pearls. I ended up buying a pair of real (cultured) ear-rings (plain round studs which I can use daily) and felt very pleased with my purchase.
I had a very pleasant flight on Jet Air where I finally had something to eat: a Chicken Sausage Roll (basically a chicken sausage in a blanket) and a cup cake with a small bottle of water. It seems that domestic Indian Airlines are no longer offering tea or coffee or any other beverage. It is only water--in small plastic bottles that are adding to the destruction of the environment.
We arrived in Bombay about a half hour behind schedule as we could not get a landing bay. Right outside, I found a rickshaw and was home by 11. 45am. I told Dad that I would be at his place for lunch. I spent the next hour airing out my studio, beginning my unpacking and getting myself organized again.
At 12. 40, I left home, was at Dad's five minutes later and had lunch with him: potato Chops, meatball Curry and okra with potatoes. It was great to catch up with Russel and find that his skin infection has cleared up completely--Praise the Lord! He is in excellent spirits, his vigor and happy spirits returning more strongly each day. He can now swing both his legs right down the side of his bed and he sits up for impressive lengths of time. Physiotherapy continues with Lenita who is happy with his progress. However, he is nervous to put weight on his fractured leg and tends to lean on Dad during this particular exercise.
About two hours later, I returned home with the laundered bed linen that I would use to re-make my bed. I finished unpacking and also did a thorough cleaning of my home and bathroom and was about to relax when Shahnaz called me to ask if I was interested in accompanying her to an art exhibition in the city. She said it was a walk-through of the gallery that is carrying a retrospective on the work of artist M.V. Dhurandhar followed by a panel discussion. I was, of course, up for anything concerning art. I told her I would be happy to join her. Next thing, I knew, we were in a rickshaw heading to Bandra station to take the train from there as I told Shahnaz I refused to sit in an Uber in traffic for two hours! We were in the city in half an hour--much to Shahnaz's delight. From Churchgate, we took a black and yellow cab to the National Gallery of Modern Art which is right opposite the Prince of Wales Museum.
Becoming Acquainted with Artist M.V. Dhurandhar:
The 'walk-through' which included a docent lecture was given by Suhash Bahawulkar who also curated the exhibition which is entitled "The Romantic Realist'. It was packed--there were about 35 people which, as a docent myself, I know to be too large a group. Still, he did a wonderful job as he walked us chronologically through Dhurandhar's entire oeuvre from his early years as a student at the J.J. School of Art in Bombay back in the late 19th century when it was still under the Principalship of British artists--Solomon was the Principal in his time--to his actually becoming the first Indian Director of the same School! He was a water-colorist (superb work in that medium), a narrative oil-painter (much influenced by Raja Ravi Verma, whose work I had seen, for the first time at 17 in the Napier Art Gallery in Trivandrum in Kerala), an illustrator (of contemporary periodicals, books, posters, etc), a postcard designer, etc. As in the case of most artists, he went where the work took him. By the early 20th century, he was able to sail to Italy and see something of Europe. His personal life was also brought into the picture--his love for his first wife who died young of the plague, followed by his second marriage--also very happy. He celebrated both women in several portraits. He was also a great documentarian and diarist and we have fabulous historical records of the J.J. School from his writing and his journals that have survived--many of them were on display. I was absolutely enchanted by his work, his early indebtedness to the work of Raja Ravi Verma and his gradual evolution into an artist that displayed Modernist tendencies although he was a precursor of the Progressive Artists Group that then took Indian art by storm in the second half of the 20th century.
After the docent guided tour, there was a discussion on his work by four panelists led by Abhay Sardesai who edits a magazine called ArtIndia, Suhas Bahawalkar and two women whose names I did not catch--one is a professor of Art History at Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi, the other works from Bombay. I found the discussion deeply absorbing for I learned so much about his life and times, his family members (he encouraged his daughter Ambica, an artist in her own right- to paint and to become a student at the J.J.School)--reminiscent, for me, of the relationships between William Morris and his daughter May in England and in an earlier era, the relationship between Orazio Gentileschi and his daughter Artemisia whose reputation exceeded that of her father.
At question time, I asked if the art historians were able to offer any information about Dhurandhar's descendants, their role in the retrospective and their possible interest in his work as collectors. I got a rather vague response from the dais; but after the discussion ended, one of the women seated in front of me, named Anita, turned around and told me that he has great grand daughters who were present at the inauguration of the exhibition. She said that one of them is in the States. I asked if she knew her name and she said Kavita Gonzalves! You could have knocked me down with a feather! I told her, I know Kavita well...and I also knew her in India, before marriage, when she was Kavita Dhurandhar. And then the penny dropped! Can you believe it? All these years of knowing Kavita as a close friend and classmate of mine at Elphinstone College, Bombay, and I had no idea that her great grandfather and her grandmother were artists who can claim a very renowned place in Indian art history. I knew that Kavita married her college sweetheart Glenn Gonzalves--they have two grown-up children and are settled on Long Island where I usually meet them at parties thrown by mutual friends there. What a tiny world! I was still reeling from my discovery when we left the place after a very enlightening evening. The retrospective ends tomorrow--so I felt very fortunate that Shahnaz asked me to join her today to see such sterling work.
Dinner at Woodside Inn:
We then met up with a friend of Shahnaz's called Shonando, who lives in Poona but was in Bombay for work. He would be traveling with us to Bandra to spend the night at Shahnaz's place. As we wished to avoid traffic and were very hungry (although the Gallery had thoughtfully provided tea and samosas after the tour and before the discussion), we went to a restaurant called Woodside Inn at the corner of Nathanalal Parekh Marg opposite the Sahakari Bhandar where my companions had a beer while I had a lemonade. For dinner, we shared a delicious thin crust pesto grilled chicken pizza which, like almost everything in India, was exceedingly flavorful.
We made the mistake of taking an Uber taxi back as Shunando had baggage--the result was that we sat in traffic going back to Bandra for over an hour--the train would have been a much wiser option. This is because Navratri has started in Bombay and people are out and about going to parties to dance the Dandia-Raas which is a traditional dance with sticks.
By the time I reached home it was 10.20 pm and I was ready to drop directly into bed--I had dozed off a bit in the car, I must admit.
What an unexpectedly fabulous day it turned out to be! I love the fact that ideas that are dropped spontaneously in my lap often turn out to be the best ones. I learned so much about an Indian artist of great repute (of whom I had never even heard) and about his family connections to someone with whom I was once very friendly.
Until tomorrow...
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