‘In Hindu culture, nudity is a metaphor for purity'

Maqbool Fida Husain tells SHOMA CHAUDHURY why his faith in India’s secular and tolerant traditions remains undiminished

Husain saheb, what do you feel about the fundamentalist attacks against you?
I’m not really perturbed by all this. India is a democracy, everyone is entitled to their views. I only wish people would air their views through debate rather than violence.The media comes to me looking — almost hoping — for strong statements, but I am actually very optimistic about India. I see this as just a moment in time. For 5,000 years, our work has been going on with such force, this is just a minor hiccough. I am certain the younger generation will get fed up of the fundamentalist, conservative mood in the country and change things. I didn’t want to leave my home. At the same time, it’s not even as if I want the conservative element to be pushed out of society. We are all part of a large family and when a child breaks something at home, you don’t throw him out, you try and explain things to him. Yeh aapas ka mamla hai. (This is a family matter.) Those opposed to my art just do not understand it. Or have never seen it.

Why don’t you come back to India and take on the fight?
As things stand, I cannot come back. No one has exiled me; I cameaway myself because I am an old man and vulnerable to physical danger. It’s not just the cases. If I came back, given the mood they have created, someone could just push or assault me on the street, and I would not be able to defend myself. The only way I can come back to India, perhaps, is if the BJP comes to power at the Centre. Or maybe, Mayawati. This government has no spine. Their hands are tied. They think if they speak out or take action, they will be accused of appeasement. The irony is, out of power, the BJP uses issues like this to fan its votebank. In power, they would probably control their extreme brigades to look respectable and secular! (laughs) These are the ironies of India. Actually, it is for the courts to sort this out. The allegation that my work is obscene or hurts religious sentiment can never stand merit in a court. Perhaps, if someone filed a counter public interest litigation… It is not my place to do so.

Why did you apologise for your art? You know more about Hindu iconography and the shastras than the goons who deface your work.
Never. I have never apologised for my art. I stand by it totally. What I said was that I have painted my canvases — including those of gods and goddesses— with deep love and conviction, and in celebration. If in doing that, I have hurt anyone’s feelings, I am sorry. That is all. I do not love art less, I love humanity more. India is a completely unique country. Liberal. Diverse. There is nothing like it in the world. This mood in the country is just a historical process. For me, India means a celebration of life. You cannot find that same quality anywhere in the world.

Could you talk about how your exposure and love for Hindu iconography and culture began.
As a child, in Pandharpur, and later, Indore, I was enchanted by the Ram Lila. My friend, Mankeshwar, and I were always acting it out. The Ramayana is such a rich, powerful story, as Dr Rajagopalachari says, its myth has become a reality. But I really began to study spiritual texts when I was 19. Because of what I had been through, because I lost my mother, because I was sent away, I used to have terrible nightmares when I was about 14 or 15. All of this stopped when I was 19. I had a guru called Mohammad Ishaq— I studied the holy texts with him for two years. I also read and discussed the Gita and Upanishads and Puranas with Mankeshwar, who had become an ascetic by then. After he left for the Himalayas, I carried on studying for years afterwards. All this made me completely calm. I have never had dreams or nightmares ever again. Later, in Hyderabad, in 1968, Dr Ram Manohar Lohia suggested I paint the Ramayana. I was completely broke, but I painted 150 canvases over eight years. I read both the Valmiki and Tulsidas Ramayana (the first is much more sensual) and invited priests from Benaras to clarify and discuss the nuances with me. When I was doing this, some conservative Muslims told me, why don’t you paint on Islamic themes? I said, does Islam have the same tolerance? If you get even the calligraphy wrong, they can tear down a screen. I’ve painted hundreds of Ganeshas in my lifetime — it is such a delightful form. I always paint a Ganesha before I begin on any large work. I also love the iconography of Shiva. The Nataraj — one of the most complex forms in the world — has evolved over thousands of years and, almost like an Einstein equation, it is the result of deep philosophical and mathematical calculations about the nature of the cosmos and physical reality. When my daughter, Raeesa wanted to get married, she did not want any ceremonies, so I drew a card announcing her marriage and sent it to relatives across the world. On the card, I had painted Parvati sitting on Shiva’s thigh, with his hand on her breast — the first marriage in the cosmos. Nudity, in Hindu culture, is a metaphor for purity. Would I insult that which I feel so close to? I come from the Suleimani community, a sub-sect of the Shias, and we have many affinities with Hindus, including the idea of reincarnation. As cultures, it is Judaism and Christianity that are emotionally more distant. But it is impossible to discuss all this with those who oppose me. Talk to them about Khajuraho, they will tell you its sculpture was built to encourage population growth and has outgrown its utility! (laughs) It is people in the villages who understand the sensual, living, evolving nature of Hindu gods. They just put orange paint on a rock, and it comes to stand for Hanuman.

In what terms would you like your paintings to be spoken of and remembered?
I never wanted to be clever, esoteric, abstract. I wanted to make simple statements. I wanted my canvases to have a story. I wanted my art to talk to people. In 1948, I exhibited my work publicly for the first time in the Bombay Arts Society show. I had already been painting and practising for years. Now in those paintings, I took the classical images of the Gupta bronzes — the tribhanga form; the sensuous and erotic colours of Pahari paintings — its deep maroons, blacks, haldi; and the nine rasas. I wanted my format to be classical, yet retain the innocence of the folk. Souza came and asked me excitedly, from where have you got this? I didn’t tell him, I said, you go search it. This is what lies at the heart of the artistic enterprise.
It is in picking from what has gone before. In India, there have been so many high periods — Tanjore, Chola, Gupta… Centuries of seeing lie behind that. You cannot reinvent the wheel — your individuality, your creative eye lies in what you pick. The other thing is to find one’s own rhythm and calculation: Where exactly do you place a line on an empty canvas? Where exactly do you place the dot? How much yellow should I use, how much red. If I use 1mm of red, should the blue be a half millimeter or more? An artist’s voice lies in this calculation, this maths. To find your style and language takes 60-70 years of continuous work.

Which among your paintings do you consider the most significant, your equivalent of Picasso’s Guernica?
‘Between the Spider and the Lamp’ (1956). I feel happy with the structure of that grouping — there is a kind of mystery about what the five women are talking about. Stories perhaps even unknown to themselves. There is something in the precarious way the woman is holding the spider on a delicate thread. A fear. I rarely draw eyes, I don’t want to use eyes because to give someone eyes is to define and identify the person. I prefer to make the body expressive. To understand hand expression, I had observed Rodin’s sculptures — ‘Men of Calais’. To that I brought a knowledge of classical mudras. So much is made of culture and tradition in India, yet 60 years after Independence, art students are still made to study the body from Greek art. Dr Kumaraswamy does not even find mention. In colleges, you learn about Shakespeare and Keats, Kalidas does not find mention. This is why there is no pehchan in India, no recognition of what is Indian. Things are so farcical that years ago when the Benaras Hindu University honoured Subbulakshmi, JRD Tata, Mother Teresa and me, we were given red caps and cloaks! (laughs) This was the seat of Hindu learning! The custodian of Bharatiya sanskriti! Is there anything that you find obscene in the world? Bad behaviour. That is all.