Ways of seeing

The second time, I arrived at the gallery in the morning to find it already open and my Naga friend in deep thought in front of the same painting. This time he did come to me and his words gushed forth in an incoherent torrential stream.

I was unable to respond, as no group of words formed a whole sentence. They were like scattered pearls from a broken necklace. I was left with just an “impression” of a highly intelligent but very disturbed mind.

This, until he picked up an orange felt-pen lying on the table and started drawing a diagram. About six shaky, wavy concentric circles, with no centre, on one corner of the page.

He put the “centre” at the other furthest corner of the page with his first coherent comment: “These are my thoughts.” And then, pointing to the disembodied centre, said, “This..is my mind…But that painting brought this here.” He shifted the centre somewhere between the two outer circles, “It talked to me.” After that, communication became easier for the following few minutes, until more people came in and demanded my attention.

He came almost every day after that, made the same diagram lest I had forgotten, trying desperately to explain what I was already beginning to understand.

The last day of the exhibition was a repeat of the previous occasion. He had beaten me to the gallery again in the morning. The lights had still not been turned on, but he was busy writing in the “comment book”, even while carefully covering his comment with his hand.

Much later—after the closing of the exhibition—I read his comment: “I was really impressed by all your works but I weep when I see ‘Gujarat-2002’, because it talks to me.” It was signed with an underlined poignant question mark.

After that I find that none of my own works have the power to disturb me as much as those crumpled white sheets with their wavy, shaky concentric circles and their disembodied centre… and the underlined question mark crying for a place in the sun.

I hope Rengma finds himself in a world of peace one day.