Celebrating Abstract

by NAGUESH SARDESSAI
Posted on 2008-11-02
Suhas Shilkar, well-known abstract painter, is showing his paintings and drawings at ‘The Attic Art Gallery’, Panaji.
Suhas does not require introduction. His abstracts are a treat to the eye and fodder for the intellect. He is a thinking man’s artist. Each of his work is loaded with intriguing combination of forms and lines over interesting colours.
Suhas has moved from playing with the forms and colours to experimenting with pure lines and basics of painting. The lines, in the current context, do not attempt to give shape to a form or speak a formal language. Here, he has gone beyond the obvious. The lines have a standing of its own which comes out to formulate a slightly different language.
Suhas dares to introduce fresh aspects to the regular artistic vocabulary. Gone are the days where his works, to a slight extent, represented the seen and the tangible. The current works seem to take off from the abstract to redefine the abstract.
If his earlier works invited the viewer’s into the painting and narrated a tale, these fresh works seem to move out of the canvas and introduce its own self. The lines, intermittently scattered pigment and accidentally created forms collectively seem to be in a hurry to connect with the onlooker. His works reflect the changing times. Suhas plays a psychological game with the canvas. He seems to allow his canvas do the speaking however it is calibrated to do his bidding. This makes it obvious that Suhas has complete control over the output. These seemingly spontaneous works are guided to give a desired result.
Amongst all the average to reasonably big canvases, few of his small sized drawings evoke spontaneous reaction.
The show is on till November 13.