Leela Mukherjee Proved That 'Gharana' Art Can Be Just as Inventive

It was while she was in Delhi in the eighties and nineties that I got to know the range of Leela Mukherjee’s creativity better. The few of her mixed media paintings I had come across excited my curiosity, and I asked to see some more, knowing that for the past few years she had spent most of her time drawing and painting. A little daunted by the mountains of paper spilling over the tables in her home, I nevertheless set to the task of unrolling endless rolls of paper. As image after image pranced out, I was led first by their exuberance and ingenuous spontaneity into a place in the world they made for Leela Mukherjee. As I went along traversing these known/unknown lands, the pictorial configuration grew denser; layers of language impacted meaning into the images – not unlike the cliffs of stacked-up figure and foliage within the paintings. Which land was this where these ebullient characters enacted drama and played games, I wondered? 

9 June 2024