CONVERSATIONS WITH ETERNITY
Just two days aft er the passing away of
India’s renowned abstract landscape artist,
Rajendra Dhawan, on the 2nd November 2012,
a new kind of nature based abstraction s being
born. It marks a signifi cant departure from
the understanding of nature and abstraction,
and the politics of stillness and pause. Deepak
Tandon’s One Rock (presented by Veranda8
and showing at Open Secret Studios 401 N.
Racine, Chicago) ,manages to break a frontier
and reach a space where Indian abstraction
has not gone before. Over the years Deepak
Tandon has been developing a language that
seeks to embody the Vedantic/Tantric concept
linking Oneness and Shunya…exploring its
links with harmony, eternity and wholeness.
Yet, Tandon has persistently refused to ‘fall’
into the formally stagnated neo-tantric school
of abstraction. Aft er years of inventing and
re inventing, with this body of works, one
sees Tandon off ering a language that breaks
the formal stagnancy of the neo-tantric
school, yet retaining its conceptual depth and
philosophical anchoring.
What is the language of silence and
purity? Can these two concept metaphors
be understood/expressed in visuals created
and seen in the contemporary world? How
does one express in a visual language and
yet keep the magic of silence and purity
intact? Th ese questions form the very basis
of the metaphysical / artistic journey Deepak
Tandon embarked upon as he began to
weave together this body of untitled digitally
manipulated photographic prints, and videos
that form the body of One rock. Right from
the very beginning, Tandon’s journey has been
about understanding nature, understanding
life and living through nature and having
art as the medium through which the
understanding is practiced and expressed. It’s
been a long journey, a beautiful journey…yet
bringing him to a point wherein he needed to
re understand language, form and expression
for his art to be able to dance in tandem with
his soul.