JUGALBANDI

Sarjan Art Gallery, Vadodara, India December 2005

Peter Bevan and Ganesh Gohain 

Jugalbandi – Entwined Twins – two soloists on an equal footing

Jugalbandi: The Ever Forming Mountain

Poetry, resonance and wisdom in the art of Ganesh Gohain and Peter Bevan

I.

Lao Tzu, the keeper of the Imperial Library in ancient China, was revered for his wisdom. The Tao Te Ching, channelled  through him, is among seminal world texts – The Tao – reveals itself to those how abide by the principal,

“Those who know do not speak; those who speak do not know.”

The thinker urged ‘inaction’ (to be interpreted as restraint, patience, silence) and ‘nothingness’ (simplicity being one interpretation) as seen in metaphors of nothingness.

Ganesh Gohain: Born 1967, Khunsa, Arunachal Pradesh, India; Lives and works in Baroda, India

Peter Bevan: Born 1946, Walsall, West Midlands, UK; Lives and works in Glasgow, Scotland.

Water, yin: receptive, flexible, fluid

It can’t be destroyed.

It can overcome a rock.

Peter Bevan draws from Taoist imagery, the idea of the uncut or uncarved block of wood; its inherent ability to transform itself. Ganesh Gohain draws upon the poetics of space, the coalescing of place and memory.

Both dwell upon silence, its ability to punctuate and transform space, even as it articulates a full sentence soundlessly.

Both are drawn to energy sources vested within, for instance, the idea of the mountain.

Peter Bevan’s paper scroll unsheathes therefore the silent, seething, ever moving life-strength that coils within the idea of ‘immobility’ and ‘fixedness’.

Ganesh Gohain’s shallow flower etched bronze boat harks to transience: the now.

Both view form as outer skin/shell.

The inside remains a container, a vestibule, much like an empty vessel.

Bud, seed, flower and mountain, all evolve form a single point/continuum of energy…

…As the Tao, new energy pulsates/old energy gathers….old energy pulsates energy gathers….

II.

Bronze, wood, plaster, fiberglass, polyester resin…egg, seed, flower, mountain, table

Mountain, rock, bud, shoot, water…..paper, paint, mud pot, wood, bronze….

One builds a mountain. The other culls a valley

Rising and gathering. Cleaving and flowing.

Ganesh works with the microcosmic, making a mark repeatedly

Delicate mantras chiseled in bronze: contemplation in every inhalation

Peter casts his net wide containing macrocosm

Sweep of breeze, bend of river….each exhalation a prayer

Both reflect the source

Both return to the source

III.

A Charles Wallace India Trust awardee, Ganesh Gohain was artist in residence at the Berllanderi sculpture workshop and Glasgow School of Art from 2002-2003. His artistic discipline is akin to prayer. Meticulous, ordered, structured and formal, his sculpture has been described variously as spare, minimal and spiritual. These are all qualities that are now, increasingly, more palpable, stemming perhaps from the fact that the artist does not see his art as separate from his life – the everyday occurrence is as much a source for poetry as is the sudden epiphany. Even as he works and presents his art in a contemporary climate within larger international discourse, the attempt, consistently, has been to journey inward. Ganesh’s roots remain firmly entrenched in the soil of his homeland; he remains receptive to his environment and his dear ones. This new body of work – with particular reference to the artist’s table from underneath which spill 600 eggs, referred to by the artist as “portraits” – establishes Ganesh as a sculptor who possesses the exceptional ability to distil the personal to arrive at universal experience / shared truth.

IV.

An internationally recognized sculptor, Peter Bevan, associated with Glasgow School of Art, has made a strong impact within his home country. He shares strong affinity with India and with the work of Ganesh Gohain. He has also visited India earlier and worked here. In an earlier catalogue Doug Cocker has written that “As a maker of sculpture he clearly takes pleasure form the investigation and use of a diversity of material, surface treatments, formal devices and a range of scale”. Indeed this fluency with media is apparent in the works within this exhibition. This exhibition stems not from pre-conceived notions of collaboration, but from the discovery of the here and now. A found water pot, for instance, becomes the starting point for an exploration of he quintessential dynamics between yin and yang, negative and positive.

Together the duo strives for connectedness. Interestingly, the dialogue is akin to the idea of a jugalbandi: both challenge and compete without being competitive. One provokes, the other responds; one claps, the other bows – the result is a seamless flow of imagery that flows from one to the other. Yet both remain unique in their separateness.

V.

Scale is one apparent differentiator that allows the viewer to separate one from the other, even though volume continues to define both sculptors’ works. Peter exhibits a tendency for larger works with intricate detailing and the use of motifs, while Ganesh is inclined towards a spare form. His works evoke a more yang, linear, even masculine disposition while Peter’s preference is for a more flowing, receptive, yin vocabulary.

VI.

Both artists draw and paint, cast in plaster and bronze and model anatomy and form ….almost from the inside out.

Peter’s works range in size from the small to the monumental; Ganesh’s works go from hand sculptures to large 3D constructs. Their collaborative work, “Where is the mountain? Reflection of the mountain” is an indication of the balance that they have brought about between their individual idioms. Embodied also by Uncarved Block – a rich and dark rock found in Pawagarh and chosen from countless rocks – whose profile, if viewed from certain angles, resembles the mountain.

Displayed in a linear harness of wood, Peter’s charcoal drawing of the same rock is a reiteration of its palpable strength. The collaborative works highlight essential truths about polarities, dualities and correspondences.

VII.

Jugalbandi is a show of strength. The sort of quiet that emerges when similar, yet separate abilities resonate, reverberate and multiply. Like an ever forming mountain.

Anupa Mehta, December 2005

Collaborative work – Peter Bevan and Ganesh Gohain

“Where is the mountain? Reflection of the mountain”

(the boy figure and inverted mountain)

Before I came to Baroda to work with Ganesh I didn’t preconceive what I would make but thought I would work with the human figure as a motif, partly because I am continually fascinated by the ways in which we represent ourselves but also in 2004-5 I had been working in ceramic with portraiture as a theme. I am also impressed by Ganesh’s modelling and use of the figure in his past sculpture, feeling that I could learn from him (in fact, he helped me to resolve the modelling of the boys face in “Where is the mountain”. Later I helped him to model the surface form of “Reflection of the mountain”.

The figure became a “boy” because this represents imminent maturity, is still forming himself and is a growing energy. The pose indicates the relaxed but contained energy of the opening stance of T’ai chi, a standing, meditative position.

Mountains have become a strong metaphor in both our works. I first made a sculpture of a mountain in black granite in Japan in 1998 in response to the eminence of Mount Iwate, dominating the site of the Iwate Stone Sculpture Symposium in northern Honshu. This interest was rekindled in 2005 when I studied classical Chinese landscape paintings at the British Museum, London and preceding a visit to China in September. I was impressed by the expressive gesture in the paintings and also by the meaning invested in mountains as a metaphor in the Dao. During this study I discovered the writings of Lao Tzu and brought a book of his poems with me to India, thinking that these may also influence my work. It appears fortuitous that Ganesh visited Ladak in August 2005 and was equally influenced by the power of its mountainous landscape.

During the first few days working together, Ganesh and I decided to collaborate on a major work for the exhibition which combined our ideas about the figure and mountains together, “Where is the mountain, reflection of the mountain” was the result.

For me, the mountain signifies the presence and irrepressible energy of nature, (for the same reasons, I use the growing shoot of a plant or the bud of a flower) and since we humans are also nature, the mountain and the bud are analogies for a human presence or energy. So the mountain is not a portrait, not a particular mountain but an idea, a pure form of energy with which humans can feel empathy. In our collaborative sculpture, the boy asks, “Where is the mountain?” The answer is that the mountain is both a manifestation of natural energy and an indication of human potential. The boy find the mountain inside himself, in his imagination, it is a reflection of his potential.

Ganesh’s interpretation of the mountain is an inverted mass, a hollow volume therefore, its is not a mountain but an idea. Being inverted, it also has a kind of “feminine” form actually a valley – hence the connection with the poem by Lao Tzu, which so inspired the work of this exhibition.

Peter Bevan December 2005

“Where is the mountain? Reflection of the mountain” is meaningful for me.

Although it is a result of two-persons collaborating, I see it as one work.

I had an image of a mountain before Peter came to work with me. Images for sculpture come to me in two ways – sometimes they come first and then the thought process begins, at other moments they follow the thought process. This work emerged through from a strong image that came to me following a visit to Ladakh in August 2005.

In Ladakh, friends asked me to say something about Ladakh, mainly Pangong Lake. I said that I didn’t have words to describe my experience of it.

Words are sometimes inadequate – they come a limitation.

Now I can say that sculpture is the language I have chosen to speak about Pangong Lake and the mountains. Both parts of the collaborative sculpture are metaphors for me. It is not just an idea; the work contains a lot of ideas that must be realised individually.

“Where is the mountain? speaks a lot to me. And the answer is, Reflections of the mountain.” Yet, it is not the only answer.

The true answer lies in the realisation of many things. It has both feminine and masculine energy.

“Reflection of the mountain” also contains the entire experience of my visit to Ladakh.

Ganesh Gohain