The sound of silence in Viveek Sharma’s paintings of Sadhus of the Kumbh Mela

Artist Viveek Sharma's exhibition, Silence Please, showcases large portraits of Kumbh sadhus in Pointillist technique at India Habitat Centre. Two sculptures, one art installation and 21 oil paintings reflect a sense of solitude and gazing at them you almost hear the silence

Annual visits to his nanihaal (maternal home) in Allahabad (now Prayagraj) during his childhood gave Viveek Sharma an early peek into the lives of ascetics and helped him to fathom the quintessential spiritual lives. “I would accompany my grandfather to the congregation of sadhus during Kumbh and he would tell me about these men who abandon worldly attachments and seek enlightenment,” says Viveek.

The view of the mammoth crowds bathing in the Ganges; the faith, energy, gaze and silence of the orange-robed or semi-naked sadhus with long beards and matted hair mesmerized the young mind. The then teenager’s impressions and imagination turned into large-sized portraits of sadhus in later years as the artist in Viveek grew up studying Renaissance masters of art and was particularly inspired by Dali and surrealism and, Van Gogh and his cubism.

About two dozen such portraits by Viveek using the Pointillist technique (application of small strokes or dots of colour that visually blend together from a distance and disintegrate in close view) are mounted at India Habitat Centre. Capturing distinct moments of introspection on the faces of wanderers who lead austere lives in isolation and journey on eternal pilgrimage, the exhibition, Silence Please, draws the viewer into an inner quiet.

Viveek’s canvases, from 5ftx5ft to 8ftx8ft, carry more than the hues of his oil paints. There is a magnetizing silence in his works that elevates the viewer to connect with the gaze or expression of the meditating sadhus on the canvas. There is something intense about the paintings that create patterns of light and shade and the way he interplays the colours, from saffron, green, white and blue.

Viveek has showcased some of his portraits of Kumbh sadhus at the India Art Fair in Delhi in the past. This is the first time he is showing 21 of his artworks in a gallery in the Capital along with two sculptures. “I wanted to do the ascetics in 3D form and took help from a clay artist; one is in Bronze and the other in patina,” he says.

Additionally on an instinct, Viveek has also done a special art installation using cloth for the conoisseurs in the Capital. He has stuck colourful strands of fabric together that look both as matted hair or the long unkempt beards as part of ascetic appearance.

Of his Sadhu series, says Viveek, it became a popular travel show a decade ago when he took his portraits to a Cathedral in Da Vinci’s town in France, to Switzerland and Dar es Salam, Tanzania before bringing them to Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai, in 2017 and now for Delhi audience coinciding with the Mahakumbh happening this year.