The subdued colour effect of this exhibit by Aanupamaa Jalan is particularly attractive

The recent ceramic exhibition at Artspace of India was vibrant proof that Indian pottery has come of age. The participating artists have preferred to sacrifice utility at the alter of art but their works are endowed with the rough grace of pottery from ancient times.

The history of pottery can be traced back to the beginning of the Neolithic period. Clay was abundant. So it was liberally used to fashion objects of household use. During those primitive times, pottery was made entirely by hand. There was a dramatic change in pottery after the wheel was put to use. In fact, some anthropologists claim that the wheel was first used to shape clay, not pull the cart. Once potters learned to control heat, they were able to enhance the beauty of their pieces with various glazes.

The brand new gallery took great care to present “Mark on Clay”. The layout, documentation and arrangement of pieces by Chitropala Mukherjee and her artist friends was excellent. The famous painter-printmaker Jyoti Bhatt from Baroda informally opened the exhibition.

The pieces at the exhibition are all extremely individual works although they bear traces of the styles that inspired them. And the influences range from Chinese pottery to the ancient pottery of the Indus Valley to traditional Greek and Egyptian pottery to Picasso’s experiments in clay. The participating artists have successfully taken forward the legacy of stalwarts like Jena, Debiprasad, Nibedita Bose and Ira Chowdhury.

Most of the exhibited works are in stoneware fired at 1,100°C though there are some earthenware pieces. The lustre and subdued colour effects used by the artists are particularly attractive. Partho Dasgupta’s wheel-turned piece — a jar-like shape encompassed in a massive hilly shape with a canon peeping out — is piquant. Tamal Bhattacharya’s relief sculpture of a series of rectangles depicting a strange god has a cultic aura. Debajit Chakrawarty’s glazed and textured stoneware container and Dipankar Karmakar’s kissing lips in a bird like form are exquisite. Manoj K. Das’s temple with architectonic Vishnu image and etched and blurred verses of Gita is an excellent piece of sculpture with a slight fundamentalist overtone. Others like Anupama Jalan, Pallab Das, Prasun Ghosh and Tanmoy Das have brought in the refinement of ‘Attic grace’ in their work. They have added decorative elements, floral motifs and colourful textures of graded glazes.

Tapas Konar’s drawings on glazed ceramic plates was like a hair in a bowl of soup, a flippant statement in a serious discourse. At fifty-three, he should realise he is no Picasso. Words like Ananta Biœtarey Heyri Charachor (I view vast expanses of the world) add an even more irritating note to the facile work. To insert words in visual music is profanation, an outrageous sacrilege.

The works of the rest is out of this world. They have all gone beyond the utility value of pottery and ventured into aesthetic discourses on the intricacies of shape and forms. They have played with the void within the ceramic object and the space outside. Sometimes so successfully that the work has become a Zen dissertation on the essence of being and nothingness. This exhibition makes it evident that Indian pottery is moving into a new era.