THE DIVINE DARKNESS

THE DIVINE DARKNESS

After Budha, I wasn't sure what I wanted to paint next (not having to conform to any particular style or subject tends to bring one at a dead end sooner than expected haha) so I picked up a novel 'Half Mother' by Shanaz Bashir & snuggled in the comforting confines of my library. Interestingly last evening, when my cook brought my evening tea, he assessed my paintings for a while and then solemnly pronounced, "aap bholenathji bhi banayiye!"

BHOLENATHJI..LORD SHIVA..perhaps the most complex of Hindu deity. How does one paint the ONE who is limitless, transcendent, unchanging, formless! The one without a beginning or an end!

It is humanly impossible to explain Shiva, just as it is impossible to explain the universe, let alone paint HIM, so how could I even make an attempt!

SHIVA, that is nothingness, the vast empty space, the womb from which everything is born, and the oblivion into which everything is sucked back. A non-being, SHIVA is Eternal Darkness.

Humanity has gone about eulogizing light only because of the nature of the visual apparatus that they carry. Otherwise, the only thing that always is, is darkness. Light is a limited happening in the sense that any source of light – whether a light bulb or the Sun, will eventually lose its ability to give out light. Light is not eternal. Light happens and, it ends. Darkness is much bigger. It is everywhere. It is the only thing that is all-pervading, eternal.

So here it is, my perception of SHIVA - THE DIVINE DARKNESS!