<i>Presenting the good and evil in our lives</i>
Ruhul Amin Kajol, who has been based in Denmark for many years now, is in town, like every year, holding an exhibition of his paintings and drawings. This time his exhibition is on at the Institute of Fine Arts, DU. He has long ago departed from the buoyant and pulsating traffic art, which he did in Denmark and other European countries. This is because he feels that the world is presently torn with conflicts, chaos, greed, envy and lust for power.
Along with that, Kajol points out, are natural disasters and global warming, adding to human suffering, pain and confusion. Kajol's work, as one sees it at the Institute of Fine Arts, is no longer romantic or idyllic although it contains poetic overtures, sweeps and curls of a mind that searches for peace and contentment of mankind. Yes, he still carries on his traffic art in places like Denmark for the differently-abled, where teachers and students participate in the colouring of images taken from the Bangladeshi folklore. Thus sunbursts, peacocks, flower buds and fairytale images figure in them, to bring joy and optimism in the lives of the differently-abled. However, for years now, his work is more down-to-earth, and dealing with the unrest and discontentment of mankind.
Meanwhile, Kajol had gone on to hold two exhibitions on sculpture, in joint efforts and these too were ambitious and admirable -- especially the one at the British Council premises. Hard-working and imaginative, dedicated and daring, Kajol does not rest on his laurels, and neither does he forget his origin. He works in Denmark, teaching and painting, and bringing his work to his Bangladeshi viewers each year, rolling up his papers and canvases on way from Europe.
Kajol had Rafiqun Nabi and the late Abdul Baset as his teachers, while his contemporaries are Jamal Ahmed and Nasreen Begum. Saidul Haque Juisse and Fariha Zeba are his close friends with whom he goes into joint ventures.
Today Kajol has the opportunity to study galleries and be present for exhibitions, while at Denmark, but he says that while he admires individual pieces and enjoys his exposure to contemporary European art, he tries to maintain his own style, and not be lost in his quest for modernism.
Kajol always aims at driving home his message rather than selling his paintings to ease his life. He laments the fact that among the contemporary artists, there is the penchant to bring in all that is nouveau in order to please the buyers and connoisseurs. At the cost of puzzling and intriguing his viewers, he holds up the mirror to the confused and complex society around him -- not only in Denmark, but the world over.
Kajol still dwells on the figurative, though now he has moved on to the symbolic and surrealistic, in his quest for delineating the trouble and strife that engulfs the world. In his more recent “Democrazy”, “Killigion” and his present “Evilization” he has dealt with the lust for power and the helplessness of the average man. “Our life has become that of automatons and we live in cramped cement jungles, even in Dhaka,” says Kajol. The simplicity and bonhomie has gone out of lives in our drive to get ahead is his message.
The exhibition ends on February 15.
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