The recently ended third solo exhibition of paintings and drawings by Sanjoy Ghosh at Swabhumi bore evidence not only of his virtuosity but also of uninterrupted engagement to his easel over the past couple of decades since he held his last one-man show. During these years of apparent hibernation the virtually self-taught visualiser must have been indulging in serious introspection.

His recent exhibition, comprising over a dozen large paintings in oil, acrylic and mixed media as well as close to couple of dozen pen-and-ink drawings, evinced the masterly treatment of colour and form constituting the artist’s complex psychological milieu.

Sanjoy’s forte lie in his deep conviction in the aesthetic validity of his personal idiom. Only emphatic viewers will appreciate that, although figurative, these are but abstract expressions of the agonies and ecstasies of the artist’s inner soul. House in Mauve (in mixed media) is an example of this aspect of Sanjoy’s creative vision.

The 43rd annual exhibition of the Society of Contemporary Artists at the Birla Academy crossed one more milestone on the way of the well-known group’s ascent to ever-increasing heights. It will be an understatement to say that the member artists have kept up their experimental thrust and their zeal for newer thematic explorations. The more senior among them have proved in varying degrees their ability to further hone their original styles and aesthetic concepts. The inclusion of a couple of Bikash Bhattacharjee’s earlier pastel drawings evoked memories of the Society’s formative years.

B.R. Panesar’s spectacular shift from collage to acrylic painting—demonstrated the indefatigable devotee of the muse’s concern for environmental degradation at its various stages involving deeper to lighter shades of natural green. Another old hand, also showing considerable control of his new-found media (pastel) after having relinquished the craft of graphic painting, is Amitabha Banerjee. Shyamal Dutta Ray’s virtuosity in the water-colour medium showed once again his increasingly contemplative untitled pieces. Ganesh Haloi’s wash paintings had not only the more subtle abstract imagery, but also the new-look horizontal syntaxing of the non-representational motifs.

Sailen Mitra was the only painter in show to have made excellent use of the oil medium. His Shiva Kali and Midnight deserve particular mention. Among the sculptors, Manik Talukdar and Niranjan Pradhan retained their narrative styles of figuration, while Bimal Kundu’s semi-abstract essays in metal, wood and marble were extensions of his familiar style and ideation. Sunil Kumar Das’s elongated bronze-and-wood works bore evidence of the imaginative sculptor’s personal idiom. Atin Basak excelled in his Legacy of Birth series etchings, while veteran Dipak Banerjee’s otherwise narrative pieces took a new direction in terms of compositional tightness and clarity. Swapan Kumar made a mark in linocut.