China Blue Eyes

“Starry,starry night; paint your palette blue and grey; look out on a summer’s day; with eyes that know the darkness in my soul…” Thus starts Starry Starry Night,Don Maclean’s tribute to Vincent Willem Van Gogh,the Dutch post-impressionist painter. Van Gogh’s art holds a prominent place in the history of modern art. On the occasion of his 158th birth anniversary,which fell on March 30,12 artists from across the city are organising a tribute to the great master . The artists will create representations of Van Gogh’s frequent paintings of sunflowers.

“Van Gogh is perhaps best remembered for his sunflowers. He began to paint sunflowers to decorate a bedroom for his friend Paul Gauguin,” says Meenal Bhawsal,one of the artists who will be participating in the tribute. And while he has never said why he liked the flower,he has made many references to them in his many letters to his brother,Theo. Many artists feel that Van Gogh’s contribution to the art world is incomparable to any one else’s. “He is one of the few artists whose name every child in every country knows,” says Harshit Bondre. “He had great passion for his work,and he was a true master of colour use,brushes and strokes,” adds Bhawsar.

Indeed,some artists compare Van Gogh’s own life to that of a sunflower. “The resemblance is uncanny. Just like a sunflower,he spent his life searching for the sun,” says Dibakar Das,an abstract painter,about Van Gogh,who suffered great bouts of anxiety and mental illness,before dying of a self-inflicted gunshot wound at the young age of 37. “It is an honour to just be able to pay tribute to the great man,” he adds.

However,this event will be no mere reproduction of his work. “We are aiming to see sunflowers as he himself saw them. The colours and the essence will remain the same. Everything else,shall be our own work,” says Mayura Khot,another participant in the tribute. “The event shall also see a screening of Lust for Life,a film by Vincente Minnelli. Based on the book by the same name,written by Irving Stone,it traces the latter days of Van Gogh’s life,” she adds.

(The paintings and the film will be showcased today at 5:30 pm at Waves Art Gallery,Sadhu Vaswani Chowk)