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Anil Revri respectfully portrays Islam in his latest exhibit |
The artistic process can be intensely involved or a candid burst of genius. Both create worthy exhibits in their own respects. But thoughtful artists take a gamble on the audience understanding their concepts or branching out on a completely different interpretation.
Art galleries, therefore, step in with slick press releases and program guides to properly “introduce” artists’ work – or rather in a way dictate what the particular exhibit is trying to say. For the casual observer, this can be a good thing. But to the discerning viewer it is inadvertently distracting.
But with Indian artist Anil Revri it is a moot point. Read the literature or step into his exhibit with a blank slate – either way you’re in for a quietly uplifting, harmonic experience.
Revri’s most recent 18-piece work was shown as New York IndoCenter’s last exhibition last week. (The art gallery/South Asian cultural center is closing down after a quick 18-month run) As with any serialized abstract concept, Revri has chosen finely tuned blueprints of internal ideas and thoughts and mutedly translated them to his canvas. He has self-imposed, rigid rules of materials and forms, allowing for an infinite allowance of ideas and emotions within a strict structure.
Revri’s concepts play out in premeditated patterns and thoughts, carefully chosen texts and meticulously selected mediums, uniting to create a deeply choreographed dialogue on the likeness of religious traditions in a global landscape. Revri’s idea is simple, yet ingenious. He addresses three themes – peace; desire, lust and greed; and renunciation as shared by Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism and Sikhism – in that particular order.
A graduate of Sir J.J. School of Art, Bombay and the Corcoran College of Art and Design, Washington D.C., Revri took three years to complete this exhibit. Titled “Cultural Crossings,” the exhibit was displayed in Chicago, Washington D.C. and at the United Nations’ Millennium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders in 2000.
The drawings, done in various combinations of gold and silver metallic markers and gold and silver graphite pencils on Arches paper perfectly fit in the small, sparse room of IndoCenter’s now-defunct gallery. The exhibit repeats patterns in triplicate, with the first six playing simple architectural designs of arches, windows and perhaps a table, with specially chosen texts focusing on themes of peace.
The only indication in the first six pieces of which religion is spotlighted comes from the delicate border of language unique to that religion. (Tibetan for Buddhism, Latin for Christianity, Sanskrit for Hinduism, Arabic for Islam, Hebrew for Judaism and Punjabi for Sikhism.)
There is the second drawing showing two lovely simple arched openings with a six-petal flower repeated in both. It is Christianity, with a Latin verse from the Bible gracing it:
Do not be conformed to this world
But be transformed by the renewal of your mind
That you may prove what is the well of God
What is good and acceptable and perfect.
Further along we see Revri’s first vision of Islam, showing a rectangular table with receding lines inside, and a group of believers circling it. The accompanying quote is beautiful, drawing attention to the peaceful harmony of those 22 figures poised around the table:
"If two parties of believers fall to fighting, then make peace between them. And if one party of them does wrong to the other, fight that wrong-doer until it returns to the ordinance of God; then if it returns, make peace between them justly, and act equitably. Lo! God loves the equitable." (Qu’ran 49.9)
The next six pieces still retain the abstract, perhaps more so than the first grouping. They are mixtures of squares, curves, angles and arches, still a mix of mediums, still bordered by language. The patterns become more involved, more finite, with delicate crisscrossing of lines and repeated shapes. The quotes revolve around the second theme of desire, lust and greed, often juxtaposing the lure of corruptible things versus the need for spiritual guidance.
With the third set we are introduced to the beauty of each language, which is now illuminated within the borders of the artwork. Revri’s form exudes clean lines bereft of flourishes, loops and flowery styles. It’s like a font almost, allowing for emphasis of meaning rather than form. The quotes honor a rejection of sin and temptation to be rewarded with the greatest of all: Allah’s love.
The 16th piece comes again to Islam, drawn with gold metallic markers and graphite pencils. The Arabic is beautiful in its spacing and modesty. The quote is a warning to heed:
"Have you seen him who makes his desires his god, and God sends him astray purposely, and seals up his hearing and his heart, and sets on his sight a covering. Who, then, will lead him after God [has condemned him]? Will you not heed?" (Qu’ran 45.23)
This exhibit, as Art in America art critic J.W. Mahoney writes, “suggests a vast and invisible presence, created mosaically from six equal vectors, an inner order so complete that its face is, gently, everywhere at once.” You come away seeing the parallels between the six religions in a marriage of text and imagery. Though Islam is portrayed as but one of many religions in this exhibit, its chosen quotes is wondrous in language and thought.
But more than that it’s refreshing to see an exhibit absent of artistic imagery frowned upon by Islamic sensibilities. There are no figures, no nudity, nothing to distract from its emphasis on the faith shared by many religions. As Mahoney writes, “To state, in art, that the deity is greater than any approach to it can be, while honoring each approach, an act of supreme diplomacy.”
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