Raza's works are a celebration of life: Ashok Vajpeyi

Renowned painter S H Raza's works are a celebration of life that evolved from an artist with faith in multiple religions, lending his paintings the tranquillity of a silent prayer, noted litterateur Ashok Vajpeyi said.
The ailing nonagenarian, who will turn 93 next month, continues to paint even as his eyesight is failing, Vajpeyi said.
"To our astonishment he continues to pick the right colours, fills them in the apt places on the canvas. It seems as if his fingertips have vision," said the noted poet while addressing a lecture on 'A Poet's View on a Painter' at the ongoing Krishnakriti Annual Festival of Art and Culture last evening here.

"Raza has brought me to a spiritual threshold. Strange, for it happened to somebody like me who has no gift of belief (in God)," he said.
Vajpeyi said the works of his fellow Bundelkhandi (in Madhya Pradesh) and the Padma Vibhushan awardee, who has spent 60 years in Paris, are an attempt to "map the geography of human soul".
Having been friends with Raza since 1979, the 73-year-old literary-culture critic recalled instances where the international artist came up as a 'man of extreme generosity'.

"He would impulsively help fellow artists and even strangers from any walk of life," Vajpeyi said, quoting an instance where Raza gave away Rs 1 lakh to a tribal painter when he overheard a telephonic conversation that the painter was unwell.

Vajpeyi, also a translator, editor and activist striving to boost interaction between Indian and foreign cultures, threw light on the life journey of Raza, from his upbringing in the tribal belt, 'full of beauty and terror' in forested Mandla district of present-day Madhya Pradesh to his arrival to Mumbai first and later to Paris in 1950, before returning to India in 2010.
"All through his six decades of stay in France, Raza kept his interest in Hindi literature alive and kicking, always eager to follow developments in the field," Vajpeyi said, reminiscing their long overseas phone calls.