The many meanings of S H Raza’s iconic bindu: From point of origin to place of refuge

“He began searching for a singular motif that could hold multiple meanings and spiritual possibilities. And from this search emerged the bindu, satisfying both his artistic needs and spiritual quest,” Vajpeyi said.

For more than four decades, the bindu, which can be translated as “dot” or “point”, served as an anchor for most of Raza’s artistic compositions. Despite being criticised by some for being repetitive, Raza, who passed away in 2016, remained unapologetic till the very end.

“With repetition, you can gain energy and intensity — as is gained through the japmala, or the repetition of a word or a syllable — until you achieve a state of elevated consciousness,” he told Vajpeyi during an interview for Celebration & Prayer.

Shades of bindu in SH Raza’s paintings

“Is bindu par dhyaan do (pay attention to this dot),” a primary school teacher once told an eight-year-old Raza, in a bid to curb the young boy’s restlessness.

“It was difficult at first, but then I got his point. Gradually, blotting out much else, my mind settled down to focus solely at that centre. It was uncanny. Savouring every one of its essential requisited colour, line, tone, texture and space. I found myself riveted,” Raza wrote in a 1989 article in the Illustrated Weekly of India.

Thus began a life-long fascination with the bindu. Growing up in the jungles of Madhya Pradesh where his father served as a forest officer, Raza’s initial work was heavily influenced by nature. In the mid-1950s, he was largely painting landscapes, devoid of figures.

The earliest hints of his iconic bindu would appear at this time, most notably with his 1953 painting The Black Sun, depicting a black orb that towers over a geometricised cityscape. The 1968 painting Black Moon had a deep black circle stand out amid fluid strokes in warm shades.

As central motif

It was in the 1970s, however, that Raza’s bindu became a central feature of his work. By this time, Raza’s palette had become denser and he had gravitated towards spiritual abstraction, inspired by the likes of Mark Rothko and Jackson Pollock.

In Bindu (1981), Raza had a black circle dominate the canvas divided into equal quarters, and encased within frames of geometric borders. The subsequent years saw several works in the Bindu series, with the motif rendered within defined frames. The Germination series reflected on the bindu as the womb of the earth, with infinite potential for life.

Painted in 1981, his seminal canvas Maa was Raza’s letter to his motherland through which he professed his longing for home. Incorporating lines from Vajpeyi’s poem Maa, lautkar jab aaunga, kya laaunga? (Mother, when I return home what should I bring?), the composition had the black orb accompanied by fluid strokes in vibrant colours, evoking memory and emotion.

Talking about his work in the 1980s, Raza once said: “My present work is the result of two parallel enquiries. Firstly, it aimed at pure plastic order, form-order. Secondly, it concerns the theme of nature. Both have converged into a single point and become inseparable. The point, the bindu, symbolises the seed bearing the potential of all life…” (Artists Today: East-West Visual Arts Encounter, 1987).

Many meanings

“The bindu emerged as an icon that came to signify many things. It was the point of origin from where everything began, whether a line or a form. It became the concentric circle that emanated energy and radiated outward, a still center of concentration, meditation and reflection. On another plane, it also became a point of withdrawal and solitary refuge from the chaos of the world,” Vajpeyi said.

Over the years, as Raza created his own universe around the bindu, he also imbibed it with themes such as the tribhuj (triangle) and prakriti-purusha (the female and the male energy). Though predominantly rendered in black, the bindu also appeared in other colours — including the intense blue center in the oil Blue Bindu (1983) and the white core in Shanti Bindu (2007).

“In his creative process, bindu could both be the starter and the concluding form. Sometimes he would begin with the concept of the bindu and build the composition around it, bringing it alive as the vital epicenter. At other times, he would do something and then place the bindu within,” Vajpeyi said.

Painted months before he passed away, Raza’s very last canvas, Swasti (2016), had a central bindu surrounded by concentric circles and radiating lines. As Vajpeyi put it, “It is a work bidding farewell, an offering of good wishes for all.”