reality that he had come to paint in his chosen language of figurative abstraction. Over
five years, he suffered and felt the relationship between his work and the life which surrounded him become
more and more attenuated. By 1980, he decided to go somewhere that would help him return to flesh and
blood experience. Banaras naturally pulled him; he had been there before in 1979 and was quite attracted to
its picturesque qualities. He was deeply impressed with the city’s structure not plainly looking into its
architecture but rather on the structure of human activity. Banaras’ sky which keeps changing and playing
with the colours of the river and the sky’s reflection onto it. Also, his father died recently and there was a need
to find a place to gain perspective, closure and renewal. the visit gave him profound visual experiences that
led him to recognize that unpredictability of human endeavor and which freed him to find visual to find visual
material in the aesthetics of the unrelenting cycle of life in a place that is both ancient and continually
transforming. He started painting the city, a theme that he has elaborated for more than three decades.
These ghat paintings, as I call them, are all visuals perceived from a boat, an observation that the artist’s
daughter, Manisha Parekh, first brought to his attention. they have transformed over the years; strong
geometry painted in earthy colours has led to very expressionistic brush marks made in sweeping strokes in
electric colours , especially indigo blue, purple and India green. Along the way, he has incorporated his love
of miniature paintings from the Pahari courts.
Parekh considers himself more of a physical painter rather than an intellectual even if his paintings are
inspired by the beauty of poetry, fiction, history, and criticism that he reads. He admired activities of the
common people in Banaras, watching over the ghats as people say their prayers, do mundane things, bath,
sleep, enjoy the air, talk to friends, do yoga. For him, it was the world in miniature and there is not a second
of silence. Still, deep within him is a sense of solitude despite the hustle and bustle of this magnificent city.
Between 1965 and 1975 when he lived in Kolkata, he met and inaugurated lasting friendships with the writer
Shakti Chattopadhyaya and Subhash Mukhopadhyaya; the artists Somnath Here, Jogen Chowdhury,
Ganesh Pyne and Shyammal Dutta Ray. In 1975 he shifted to New Delhi as a consultant to the Handicrafts
Handloom Export Corporation of India. He resigned his job in 1990 and embarked on a fresh phase of life as
an independent artist. A benchmark exhbition of his mixed-media paintings, made in homage to the victims
of the infamous Bhagalpur blindings in Mumbai, followed soon after by his ‘Banaras Landscape’ exhibition
in New Delhi. Since then Parekh has held solo exhibitions, participated in a series of group shows and had
been shown in curated exhibitions such as ‘The Pursuit of Intensity’. In 1992, the Government of India
honored Parekh with the Padma Shri.
Text Reference:
Excerpts from the book Faith edited by Annapurna Garimella published by Art Alive Gallery in 2012
Awards
- Birla Academy of Art and Culture Award, Calcutta, 1971 & 1991
- All India Fine Arts and Crafts Society Award, 1972 & 1974
- Silver Plaque of the President of India, 1972
- National Art Award, Lalit Kala Academy, 1982
- Padma Shri, Government of India, 1992
Books
- Manu Parekh Banaras: Eternity Watches Time
- Banaras: Painting the Sacred City
- Manu Parekh: 60 years of selected works
- Faith: Manu Parekh in Benaras 1980-2012
- Manu Parekh: The Dialogue Series
Top 10 Auction Records
Title
|
Price Realized |
Man Made Blinding
|
USD 94,875 |
Banaras in Blue
|
USD 88,000 |
Sunrise in Banaras
|
USD 72,600 |
Banaras
|
USD 72,600 |
Untitled
|
USD 65,066 |
Untitled
|
USD 51,750 |
Blue Banaras
|
USD 51,008 |
He and She
|
USD 49,000 |
Banaras Sunshine
|
USD 47,983 |
Banaras at Dawn
|
USD 46,269 |