Strokes of strength

Strokes of strength
By Jamal Shaikh

A landscape, a view, a pretty picture
What the mind sees may be laced with tincture…

Tell us truly; when appreciating art, are you ever supremely confident that your interpretation of a painting is the same as the artist who made it? If you’ve got a way with words, you could possibly hold a discussion on how the two views align, and discover common ground in conversation. But many connoisseurs are but mute spectators who react not with a point of view, but to a connection they feel. It could be a tinge in the heart, a sweet flashback, an instant brightness of being.

Rouble Nagi’s newest series of landscapes evoke such emotion. The mood is bold, the message pungent. Picturesque beauty is apparent, but also seen is the juxtaposition of individual thought. Grass green and blue sky, you see at one point; blood red that invigorates, but doesn’t threaten in another. There’s sunshine in a shade that overpowers all else, yet the charcoal grey is brighter with character.

Impasto strokes may be likened to calligraphy, and their beauty compared to the Chinese alphabet, where the reader knows where the author began the composition of his stroke, and where he intended it to go. It’s not reading between the lines, it is understanding every move. Nagi’s audaciousness on canvas absorbs you, valiantly leading from the front. You’re never quite left to fend for yourself.

What makes the artist so confident about her view of nature? The answer lies in a heartening find: Rouble Nagi is a strong Indian woman of today, not one with passive desires or unfulfilled emotions, but with a view grounded in reality. She’s modern and urbane, as are her complexities. Love, heartbreak, duty, responsibility, ambition and desire all find a place in her world. She confesses to creating these pieces at a time when she was expecting her first child; a self-encompassing frame of mind no male can even claim to understand.

Go on; take in each frame with the contagious sense of strength it proffers. In all its simplicity, this is art that won’t just brighten up the wall, it’ll colour your day!




:Jamal Shaikh is the Editorial Director of the Indian editions of Robb Report and Men’s Health

STROKES OF STRENGTH

I have always cared about expressing my emotions and feelings rather than only making a picture look real. My style of painting a canvas still remains the same, I like to be a part of every canvas I paint. This series I painted while I was on the move in Europe and the middle east.  Every landscape is so different than the other, as I painted and ventured into the abstract realm once again.  The paintings I have created this time have a lot of texture, and getting an impasto effect using very thick paint so that the brush and knife work, my strokes are clearly visible. The paintings have been created on locations. Being a mural artist I always pay attention to the environment around me  while creating an installation, in the same way while painting these canvases  on site I observed the subtle differences  and shifts in color value and shape. It helped me personally to orchestrate my paintings to achieve the truth of the scene.

Every artist has his own perception, my perception has always been based on knowledge and awareness it is this attentiveness that helps me create. If you observe carefully nothing in my painting is still, forms seem to hover up, around and collide as they fall creating new shapes altogether. You may notice a startling contrast between thin transparent paint, and thick textured impasto used to create my subject.  No two compositions are alike  , if in a canvas I have used vivid colors with abstract composition to catch your eye the other may have completely saturated tones. Some of them are a sophisticated mix of warm and cool colors mostly low intensity with a punch or two of intense color just to break the monotony. Like I mentioned earlier my canvases are not still, they have rhythmic energy, so do my strokes when I paint. My strokes and use of colors which has to look visually very interesting to me, I am able to achieve this because I just let go and feel the juice, the energy , the vibe of the painting. Just one simple formula works every time no boundaries and limitations my canvas allows me total freedom.

I enjoyed growing up a part of my life in Kashmir. We had the mountains and the meadows, beautiful landscape. We were outdoors all the time and we played outside. This journey was full of memories from my childhood, kept having a ton of Déjà vu. It worked positively for me, as I believe that everything you need for life is provided at birth and your life’s path is already somewhat chosen for you. Would conclude by saying that I painted my last canvas of this series a month before I created my masterpiece, my son on. 14.02.2012. Hope to see everyone at the exhibition.

 

“Any landscape is a condition of the spirit.” Henri Frederic Amie