Conversing Social Tools
An exhibition by Rajendra Patil / PARA
“Conversing Social Tools” is a review which looks at the journey of PARA and how he has built up his vocabulary in abstraction. He speaks of this lexicon with recognised forms in his paintings which are deconstructed shapes of abstracted agricultural tools.
In a village in Khandesh, Para grew up watching his father and his kinsmen use tools fashioned to cultivate land for agriculture, made by traditional blacksmiths were cast in the villages using centuries-old techniques of sculpture. Para’s sculptural practice reiterates these tools into abstract shapes, monumentalising them into conversing tools. He draws from indigenous fors presented through an aesthetic prism of contemporaneous modernism. These shapes talk to each other and to the audience who recognise the patina on the metal – bringing them nostalgic memories of their childhood.
The conversation with the tools of his past continues in the monotoned canvases of Para which hold deep hues and textures of layers that build an orchestrated pictorial surface arranged in purposeful rhythm that retells the regionalism of mud homes flattened and smoothened by the hands of the women in his village.
It is deep and loud, arising from these paintings letting us know who the artist really is his nativity in philosophy and form.
Sumesh-Manoj-Sharma
Andalusia, 2024
