In Quest of Truth and Beauty

Of his 70 years of life. Samarjit Roy Chowdhury has devoted at least 50 years to painting. Having obtained a degree in Graphic Design from the Institute of Fine Arts, Dhaka, in 1960 he has taught there until retirement. He has continued to teach and paint even after that. How could he live without painting!

Samarjit is an extremely amiable person, gentle and quiet. His works have been a part of group exhibitions in many countries of Asia, Africa, Eupope and North America. He has won a national award. These did not in any way, affect his modesty and humility. He has shied from the public eye, his solo exhibitions have been few and far between though he has produced plenty. He has rightly been recognized as one of the foremost painters of Bangladesh.

Samarjit has worked in several media: oil, watercolour, acrylic, pastel, gouache, mixed media. He has also done a few pen and ink drawings. The subject-matter of his works are taken from the world he lives in: man and nature in Bangladesh. In his works have come out the village of his memory and old Dhaka, the dream and vision of his younger days, the splendour of Bengali seasons, the day of the harvest, the sunset and moonlit night, flowers and gardens, birds and fishes, farmers and fishermen, bride and young girls busy with toiletries. On many occasions he has worked on the same theme in different media, attaching the same tiles to those.

Early in his career, he expressed himself in a realistic manner. Then his images became stylized and, having lost their own contours, took altogether different forms. A consequence of this was seem in the geometrical shapes that came to dominate his works. Later, when he moved towards abstraction, the geometrical figures have appeared over and over again.

In his works of pastel one notices thick coatings while the surface is fully covered with pigments. Sometimes the bottom part of his watercolours or acrylics are filled with delicate drawings. His acrylics also bring out an effect of oil painting. Usually lines are overtaken in his works by colours. For instance, the flowers in his vase or garden spread their hues beyond their confines to the whole surface. Again, when he applies lines, their ornamental quality and delicacy please the viewers to no end. In many of his works he does not narrate anymore but expresses the depth of his feelings through the interplay of light, colour and space. He has preference for bright colours, but at times he uses black to signify the evil. Samarjit would rather have the black clouds disperse and our lives filled with the splendours he had witnessed in his childhood.

Anisuzzaman
23 January 2007

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