Web of dreams and desires

Jai Zharotia's art chases the poetic and fantastic realms, drawing inspiration from miniatures as well as modern art movements.

He's the teacher as well as the taught. After years of teaching at the College of Art, Delhi, Jai Zharotia is looking forward to doing his own work now that he's retired.

And he does look relaxed as he signs copies of the catalogue for his ex-students at Delhi Art Gallery. This is the catalogue for Zharotia's latest exhibition "" Alchemy of Change "" that is being showcased at the gallery till January 13, 2007.

The exhibition showcases Zharotia's works from the eighties when he was "caught in his own private world and not guided by market forces". But then, by his own admission, Zharotia claims to have never been guided by market forces. " I always painted for my own creative satisfaction. After spending an entire day doing art with my students, I used to take out some time for myself. It was an exhaustive phase and my own search kept me going," he says.

Born in 1945 to a humble craftsman family that led a simple life in the Anand Parbat area of New Delhi, Zharotia's self-driven struggle and sensitive nature pushed him towards literary and artistic pursuits. While still in school, he was greatly inspired by a signboard painter who worked in their neighbourhood and decided to teach himself some art. And there was no stopping after that. His quest took him to railway stations, the zoo, the tonga stand in the Karol Bagh area, where he spent hours sketching animals and human figures and trained himself in the basics of painting.

"It all happened very gradually. After school, I went and got myself a diploma in art. Then someone told me about the College of Art and I thought, why not? And other things followed," he says. Once through with college, the next gradual thing was to join the college as a teacher.

"At college, teaching became my learning. It was more like clarifying my ideas. I was learning along with my students," he says, his only regret being that it drained him of his energies to paint for himself. It was perhaps his discipline to devote a couple of hours to himself that paid him off and the painter in him polished his skills.

A versatile artist, he works with several mediums at once. His favourite medium, however, remains watercolours. "I love the way it helps me submerge in a dreamy state with soft, watery blurs and gestures, while pen and ink allow me to draw out precise forms," he says. Little wonder that even while using acrylic he likes to thin it down so he can create an effect of thin layering.

Dreamy is how he defines his art. And you can see the effect in most of his works "" series with titles like Dream Series, Mystery Series, Flights of Fantasy Series and even the Luqman series. Luqman, as Zharotia tells you, is a fictitious character from the poetry of his friend and a very well known poet, Soumitra Mohan. "I love Luqman for the fact that he can do anything and everything and, most important, he is constantly in search of himself."

"He's good, he's bad. He's a trickster, he's a hero. He has in him all the shades and he fears nothing," he says, a dreamy expression taking over him.

And then there's the Gymnast Series inspired by a woman gymnast he'd seen performing way back in 1980. Or the Bull, the animal form that he chose to master at a point of time moving ahead from drawing different animals in the earlier days.

For someone, who greatly appreciates modern Western art, Zharotia is more proud of his Indian influence. "Spirituality is the soul of India," he says. "It is all very intuitive. Why, look at the way our Pahari paintings so beautifully depict all four seasons in one single painting. Everything is conceptualised so beautifully. It's every bit so human, just like us." And our dreams or, perhaps, the figures on Zharotia's canvas.