Page 40 - Art and Crafts of Bangladesh

PAINTING 37

picture that represents a dream image of typical Bengal– this is the main theme of his
painting during this period. The surge in Quamrul Hassan’s creativity began from the
sixties. In the fifties he tried to create a suggestion of folk painting through charming
and full outlines and the flat application of colors, very much like Jamini Roy’s
methods. From the sixties, Quamrul Hassan’s creation began to grow in terms of
numbers and diversity. In this period, he used woodcut, linocut and other print media
just as he painted in watercolor, oil color, gouache, acrylic and other media.
Overcoming the direct imitation of Bengal’s folk art and the influence of Jamini Roy,
he got involved with various experiments– with the indigenous elements he added the
concise conviction, exaggeration and transformation of the drawings of Picasso,
Matisse and others, or, in a Cubistic manner, representing objects on the same
pictorial plane from different points of view. From the seventies, satire and fantasy
gradually began to be combined with his work. Also, in the case of subjects, Quamrul
Hassan gradually abandoned the traditional rural scenes, became much more
contemporary, socially conscious and vocal. The mass movement of sixty-nine and
the Liberation War of seventy-one inspired him enormously and the nature of these
socio-political struggles has been intensely represented in his paintings. The poster
drawn by him during the Liberation War, Annihilate these demons (fig 4.9), inspired
the whole nation. In the period after the independence of Bangladesh, Quamrul
Hassan created paintings, prints, and even executed a few sculptures. He
progressively moved towards creating his own distinction and pictorial language and
this tendency was unabated till his death. The ruined dreams and frustrations in the
post-independence period of Bangladesh were portrayed in his paintings through
numerous symbols– the use of owl, fox, skeleton was observed frequently. His lines fig. 1.20 Quamrul
gradually became sharp and measured, the delicate expression of the earlier period Hassan, Drawing-7, after
faded away and the lines became succinct yet meaningful and significant. His Nirantar, (Dhaka 2005)
tendency towards unpleasant and terrible subjects
rather than charming and pleasant subjects continued to
increase, the world of fantasy started to find its way
through. These are illustrated in Chandraloke
Hatabhagya Ghora (wretched horse in moonlight),
Image, Fox, Gonohotyar Parey (After the Genocide)
and many other works. However, Quamrul’s creativity
was at its peak in his drawings. It seems that in the
hundreds of small and large drawings, Quamrul Hassan
has written a journal on the life of men and the nature
of Bengal. From the fine and subtle lines to short
calligraphic lines, thick strokes of the brush, broken
lines through daubs and scratches of the brush, he has
expressed the language of lines in many ways. A
synthesized form of east and west has merged within
his lines (fig 1.20).