Son Et Lumiere, By The Thames

If you are in London between September 11 and 14 of this year, make sure to spare an evening to go to Victoria Embankment on the south bank of the Thames to see 'Bajra --- the peacock boat,' a vehicle made up of animated light panels more than 7 metres long and 5m high.

It is part of 'Din Shuru', an Indian carnival that is the centrepiece of the Thames Festival of the Mayor of London. The light boat is the showpiece of the 'Midnight menagerie procession of lights,' with commissioned work from 43 artists and 2,000 participants.

'Bajra,' a Hindi word that means a pleasure boat for use on rivers (you hold private mujras or dance parties or concerts on them or use them for rides), represents the new generation of art products that are being shipped from West Bengal to the west.

 

It's huge: a 80ft marine container will be needed to transport it. The one for the UK is almost ready and will be carried by ship because it is so elaborate. Humbler specimens have been winging their way west since 2001, like images of Durga shipped by the dozens, and non-animated pith and glass items.

'Bajra' marks a new high, so to speak. "When the Bajra is switched on the sculpture comes alive in an extravagant style that puts the Blackpool illuminations to shame," the UK deputy high commission said towards last month end.

The shimmering parade of art will reclaim the streets for a glittering river of light all the way along Victoria embankment, Blackfriars Bridge, west along Upper Ground to the Royal National Theatre, it added. The entire composition of light is being purchased outright by the Mayor's office and Festival.

The 'Din Shuru' agenda is also special: a large number of craftsmen from Kolkata will be in London to work alongside UK artists in schools and with community groups.

There is a return leg too: in December, Thames Festival artists will bring their show to Kolkata to work with schools and academies to recreate it on Kolkata's streets with a fireworks finale to light up the city.

Behind the development of this exchange are a couple of individuals. The first is Nandita Palchoudhuri, a specialist in the management of non-government organisations with a degree on the subject from the US. She designed 'Bajra' and commissioned Sridhar Das of Chandannagore (West Bengal) to build it.

It will have over 125,000 individually wrapped mini-light bulbs arranged into animated groups and figurative patterns. It will consume 120KVA of power and will be mounted on a spaceframe chassis.

Das added his touch to the sculpture by coming up with a digital controller for the lights instead of the normal mechanical cut-out.

The creation draws on a long heritage of art. One of the unique art forms developed in Bengal specifically for display during the five-day Durga Puja festival at Kolkata were animated light panels made up of small light bulbs controlled by a motorised panel.

Called 'bati' in Bengali, the animated panels play out topical stories like the Cricket World Cup or major disasters and tragedies like earthquakes or 9/11. In dull years, traditional stories from the epics hog the limelight.

Around 300 pandals every Puja order light panels. The average contract cost is between Rs 25,000 and Rs 5 lakh, depending on the length and complexity of the panel.

The time required to deliver a Bajra or light panel depends on the size and complexity of it but the approximate delivery time is a week for simple 4X4ft panels and more than a month for elaborate ones.

While the designers of such panels may be from Kolkata, the artisans are all from Chandannagore, a small town sandwiched between the Grand Trunk Road and the river Hoogly 40 km to the north of the city.

Around 2,000 artisans work in the sector. The artisans are all locals. This makes Chandannagore the sole repository of the special skills needed to make animated light panels.

"The light panels represent an island of excellence that has come to be recognised today beyond India," says Palchoudhuri. The unique 'bati' or lighting tradition of Chandannagore is attributed to the fact that the town had a colonial legacy different from the rest of the country.

The town was a colony of France in a sea of English dominions. 'Bajra' is, in fact, the second such major export to UK. The first, also done by Palchoudhuri, was light panels telling the story of Diwali and its firecrackers through light shows, shipped by air to the Queen's Festival in Belfast in 2001.

Comprising six 8ft by 8ft panels, it is now permanently housed in Belfast though it requires constant maintenance because of the high rate of attrition of the lamps and adjustments to the mechanical cut-out.

Incidentally, the cut-out works on the same principle as the pin and drum systems used to play musical tunes in slot machines.