Namrita’s works (below) are in vibrant hues and interesting textures

Here’s a quick quiz for you. How do you manage to convert a poet grandfather’s seminal poem into a series of symbolic images, custom-ised to fit the sensibilities of a contemporary visual generation? Well, that’s exactly what Namrita Bachchan (yes, she’s a true blue member of the famous clan) has just tried her hand at.

Namrita has presented Harivansh Rai Bachchan’s poem, Madhushala, a eulogy to wine and the joy of living, in a new avatar. She’s turned the highly metaphorical work into a clutch of texturally-rich illustrations. The young painter poet has rummaged through the recesses of her family treasure trove and has come up with the glossy, bilingual volume. “The work is an individual response to my grandfather’s art. Using my own sense of imagery, I have recreated Madhushala in my own style on canvas,” she says.

Namrita sports multiple feathers in her cap and is a graphic designer, artist, illustrator and poet all rolled into one. She’s the daughter of Ajitabh (Amitabh Bachchan’s brother) and restaurateur Ramola Bachchan and was brought up in England and Switzerland before moving base to India a few years ago.

She also held an exhibition at The Palette Art Gallery in Delhi in December, where 21 artworks that appear in the book were showcased. Says Namrita: “This project gave me an opportunity to understand and delve into my grandfather’s creative world in a deeper way,” she says.

Namrita’s project was an ambitious one. And she created arresting visuals for the book in vibrant hues and interesting textures, formatting the typography and the layout. All the illustrations have been titled using phrases from the English translation of the poem. “Her works remind one of artists like English illustrator, Aubrey Beardsley, graphic designer, Milton Glaser and illustrator and painter, Jean-Michel Folon,” says art restorer Aman Nath.

In the coffee table re-invention of Madhushala, Namrita has used unor-thodox materials like glitter pens, correction fluids and a lot of texturisations in her illustrations along with regular media like acrylic, watercolours and pencil.

Namrita is quite the oddball in the illustrious and high profile Bachchan family. A recluse, she lives solo in a huge apartment-cum-studio in Mumbai with just a cat for company. She’s even ditched her television and car and hops on to any public transport that she can find to get about town.

Nath, who’s also a family friend, says: “She’s completely the anti-Bachchan. Unlike the Bachchans who are public figures, and hence more flamboyant and photographed, Namrita is reticent.’’

The artist acknowledges that Harivansh Rai has been her creative lifeline in more ways than one. Her decision to take up art as a career has something to do with the fact that her poet grandfather possessed certain innate artistic qualities: “He was in the habit of amassing an assortment of rocks, which served as canvasses for his creative expressions,” she says.

Harivansh Rai’s painted rock collection triggered off an artistic journey within the impressionable youngster, resulting in an abiding love for colours. “Playing with Play-Doh or coloured plasticine was the only thing that engaged me as a child,” she says.

Subsequently, she opted for a Fine Arts degree in painting and art history from the Rhode Island School of Design and a graphic design degree from the Parsons School of Design in New York.

The Bachchan scion concedes that it was her training as a graphic designer which emboldened her to produce Madhushala as a coffee table title. Of course, there was help at hand in the form of uncle Amitabh Bachchan whose company, Saraswati Creations, published the tome.

“He’s incredibly sensitive to all creative pursuits and the first person I approached when I conceptualised the idea,” she says. Inevitably, the volume comes with a foreword by the poet’s actor son.

But Namrita is no newbie to the world of book production. She had illustrated her own poems in 2006 which were subsequently published in a volume titled Deliverance. “The poems, rich in symbolism, were penned in the aftermath of my return to India from London. Hence they were my response to this country, falling in love and a host of other things,” she says.

Namrita later showcased those illustrations in a solo show in London at the Indar Pasricha Fine Arts in 2007: “All 50 artworks displayed at the exhibition were sold out and that was a mighty boost,” she says.

A typical day for Namrita begins with a coffee cuppa and meditation that’s set to the tune of her favourite music score. Post meditation, it’s time to head to the studio in her apartment and play around with colours, photographs and photo-correction software on her terminal.

It’s a life that she’s completely at peace with until she lays her hand on her next project.