HIMMAT SHAH – India’s Living Van Gogh

HIMMAT SHAH – India’s Living Van Gogh

  

Today Himmat celebrates his 81^st birthday

May he go bouncing on to a century and like the great Japanese artist Hokusai keep on belting out more n more great art.

Himmat Shah's studio was for several years at the Lalit Kala Akademi’s Garhi Artists Studios complex in New Delhi. I joined the Printmaking studio after completing B.F.A. from Delhi College of Art and met Himmat, one of the greatest living genius of India... i compare him to my all time fav Van Gogh...thankfully he has not had such a difficult life

Below I give some excerpts from @myHimmatDiary, and some pix of his works

Today Himmat Shah lives and works in Jaipur 

Please check out more of his artworks and his fab book “Terracotta” on his website www.himmatshah.com

Garhi Artists Studios 1980’s

My first encounter with Himmat Shah

Huge wooden door coloured silver....ajar....Himmat in his lounge chair with his inveterate cap and little boy grin...its open house for all..

For me - who could only admire my fav’s like Matisse, Paul Klee, Jean Arp, Noguchi, Archipenko, Miro through books - a Pandora’s box thrown open.....what works of genius! an enthralling world of sculptures, murals, prints, drawings...the mysterious, the unsaid, the abstract has always appealed to me the most...and Himmat’s work is all that and more...

Garhi Artists Studios

What does Cabbage have to do with Creativity?

I worked in the Printmaking Studio. My mom came to visit me. 

She passed a studio with the large door wide open.

Her reaction “why on earth was a man slicing cabbage in there...

surely there should be an artist working at his art?” 

That man – Himmat Shah was slicing cabbage to make delicious gujarati khichdi for all of us young artists who often floated into Himmat's studio for a free meal.

For me (my mom an excellent cook always gave me a delicious lunch dabba) it was the sheer, ethereal joy of enjoying Himmat’s genius – and listening to his riveting musings.

By the way Himmat thought my mom was very beautiful with her flawless skin and doe eyes. I agree but lament that I have not been gifted her beauty

Triveni Kala Sangam

My first Art Exhibition of Etchings

Himmat came to the opening of my very first art exhibition. I was honoured...such a senior artist. My etchings were absurdly abstract and most people thought I was off my rocker...they thought the same about my heavily ethnic apparel too...which hardly anybody knew about then....now its available on the streets of Lajpat Nagar market and every Tom, Dick or Harry rather every Timsy, Dolly or Harpreet are wearing...sorry for the digression...

Himmat asked me if I would give him one of my etchings titled Amobae !!!! speechless I dumbly nodded my head                                                                                                                                     

                                 

Himmat’s house

“We are all Artists”

Post a wonderful time at the Delhi Book Fair, where Himmat managed to beat us in picking up the best Art books, we invited ourselves over for dinner. The cook entertained us with an impromptu “Magic show”. When we lauded his talent – he informed us “everybody in this house is an artist” on which Himmat guffawed – the cook had clubbed himself in the same genius as Himmat

Coffee Home, Connaught Place 1980’s

A frisson up my spine

Deep winter in New Delhi...dusk...Coffee Home spilling over with people, dosas, sambhar, idlis, tea (not necessarily coffee). I feel a frisson up my spine...there is a presence – a benign presence...i look up...its Himmat in his Himmat cap and husky phiran quietly standing beside my table, looking down at me.

Thanks to taking up a full-time job I had discontinued going to Garhi, this chance encounter with Himmat was so special

Getting Married is so Great

Maybe I should get married several more times....:-)

No doubt i am blessed with a great spouse

but one of the best perks possible of marriage – 

Himmat gifted us his most fab sculpture! 

now now stop being greedy...

Georges Braque (1882-1963)
famous french painter, sculptor, collagist

Initially followed style of Impressionism and Fauvism. The Fauves such as Henri Matisse & Andre Derain used brilliant (or wild) colour palettes to express emotions thus being dubbed as wild beasts.

Braque is most famous for having developed "Cubism" with Pablo Picasso
Cubist paintings display geometricity, effects of light and simultaneous/multiple perspective.
In cubist paintings the forms seem to comprise of many broken up cubes, earning the term "bizarre cubes". Later cubist work were made by collage technique

1909-10, La guitare (Mandora, La Mandore), oil on canvas, 71.1 x 55.9 cm, Tate Modern, London



1913, Nature morte (Fruit Dish, Ace of Clubs), oil, gouache and charcoal on canvas, Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris.

M Balamuralikrishnan performing at Nehru park, new delhi on sunday 22 march 2014

heard lovely performance by the legendary M Balamuralikrishnan yesterday

lovely rendition of Raag Hamsadhwani....enjoyed the camaraderie of the group of 5 musicians on stage

"Contemporary Japanese Design" - Illustrated Talk by Dr. Anu Jindal

Japanese design - distinctive and idiosyncratic, has made a huge impact in modern products and lifestyle, from architecture to animation. The talk will cover the Good Design Conference and Exhibition held in New Delhi and the impact of Japanese designed products on Indian market.

13 Dec 2013, friday; 6.30 - 7.45 pm.

IIC Annexe, Lecture Room II

"Doraemon, Shinchan and Us" Art Workshop for children, conducted by Anu Jindal

Japanese animation has made a huge impact worldwide. In India, American animation programmes have largely been replaced by Japanese animation and the characters are household names.

Focusing on and inspired by the beauty of Japanese animation, children will learn to draw their favourite characters.

Age group: 5 - 11 years

Children to bring all art material - drawing papers, pencils and colours

Entry: Open, Free of charge

7 Dec 2013, saturday; 10 am - 12 pm

IIC Annexe, Lecture Room II

Enquiries: 

+91-9818884120

purplestreak@gmail.com

About Anu Jindal

Anu Jindal, artist & art historian, holds a Ph.D. in Japanese Art History from the National Museum Institute, National Museum, New Delhi. As a Japan Foundation Fellow she studied at Doshisha University in Kyoto, Japan, researching on suiboku-ga or ink painting with special reference to the 15th century Zen monk-painter Sesshu.

A graduate from the Delhi College of Art, Anu has been especially enamoured with the dynamism of dancing forms may they be human or trees or abstract representations.

Several of her art exhibitions have been devoted to works inspired by Japanese art and culture as in "Fragrance of Sakura" at India International Centre 2004; "Exuberance of Momoyama Gold from Japan" at Lalit Kala Adkademi, 2006; and "Indian Hanami" at The Japan Foundation, New Delhi an event of the Japan-India Friendship Year 2007. The paintings in this show depicted indian flowering trees the inspiration being from the Japanese custom of sakura or cherry blossom viewing (or hanami)
"Ode to Ukiyo" an event marking 2012: 60th anniversary of Japan-India diplomatic ties featured works inspired by the Japanese Art of Woodcut prints of the Edo period.

As Professor for an year at the International Research Centre for Japanese Studies, Kyoto, Anu researched on the comparative study of representation of feminine beauty in Japanese Ukiyo-e prints and in Indian Miniature Paintings.

Under the aegis of the Japanese Embassy's events marking 2012: 60th anniversary of Japan-India diplomatic ties, Anu delivered 4 lectures on Japanese Art at the India International Center and India Habitat Center.

Anu's teaching and academic career spans over two decades at institutions like National Institute of Fashion Technology, School of Planning & Architecture and National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi. She is founder-director of Purple Streak Centre for Arts devoted to the promotion and appreciation of Visual Arts. Art Appreciation and Art & Design classes are held at the Centre which are open to people from any age-group or background.

Anu's Paintings

"Summer Irises" by Anu Jindal
oil on canvas, 4' x 2'