Each day, an artist awakens to a new world.

Avijit Dutta has been painting for almost three decades from his quiet nook in North Kolkata, practising as a veritable recluse in his own city. His unabashed passion and search for the buried stories and unravelled legacies of the spaces he inhabits have richly and evocatively surfaced in his art time and again.

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Each day, he confesses, appears to him as a fresh new quest and a hunt for the known and unknown amidst the seeming ordinariness of life, where he imagines and lives his fantasies.

A year earlier, for Avijit Dutta, it was a beautiful dream realised when he was commissioned to do artwork for a commemorative stamp on the 75th anniversary of the renowned Raman Research Institute of Sir CV Raman. Once approved, the stamp was later formally released in November 2023 in the presence of the Governor in Bengaluru by India Post, cementing his bond and fondness for the city.

While creating the work, the artist’s visit to the Institute was one of awe when he witnessed up close the museum exhibiting precious gems and minerals along with other articles used by the Nobel laureate. His subsequent visit to Panchavati, the charming 112-year-old colonial bungalow, the private residence of Sir CV Raman, was an equally moving experience that left an indelible impression in his mind. Back in Kolkata, he delved deeper into the Bengal connection of Sir CV Raman as he realised how Bengal played a significant role in his life prior to his discovery and world recognition.

As the artist was preparing for his forthcoming solo in Bengaluru, organised by KYNKYNY Gallery, he suggested the co-founder, Vivek Radhakrishnan, who is also the grandson of C.V. Raman considered Panchavati for the venue as a sort of homage to his grandfather’s legacy and also for the unique Bengal connection.

In 2024, history was created when his solo show materialised. “The revisiting-treading on the footprint of thoughts” opened at the picturesque setting of Panchavati, right in the heart of Malleswaram, much like an intimate monsoon gift to the art aficionados of the garden city.

For the first time, Panchavati was transformed from a hub of scientific activity into an abode of art from 22 to 23 June. The expansive verdant garden and alluring interiors came alive with around 17 works by Avijit Dutta, which he had worked on over a period of 8–10 months. Science, poetry and fantasy seemed to have come together in a lyrical rhapsody, and the city embraced the occasion with a very encouraging response.

An enormous work depicting an expansive banyan tree and its bronze sculptural representation greeted visitors on a beautiful June evening under the canopy of a garden house with lighting that complemented the ambience and art.

Other rich and layered works beholding a certain intrigue and fragrances of Bengal and Bengaluru sat well in a holy communion across the spacious walls of the rooms of Panchavati that seem to do poetic justice to the depth and richness of the works.

Audiences were treated to a beautiful interplay of space, time, moods and lighting across a centre hall and adjoining rooms. The show organisers had infused the fragrance of a lost legacy by keeping personal items like reclining chairs, a piano, a study table and a hat stand in a near-natural setting, making the experience more immersive.

Most of the works emanated the essence of imagined spaces amidst transforming times, of conversations in whispers, of lost and found antiques. The paintings were layered and textured with visuals of implied conservations and restorations, of the mundane and compelling drama of daily living, and of the beauty of nature and its struggle for existence, topics that come repeatedly to the artist’s mind from time to time. The show later moved to the Kynkyny gallery at Infantry Road, where the works are on display until 19 July.

A short art film, “My City, My Mother”, was screened on the outer lawns, co-created by Manush John and Vivek Radhakrishnan. The engrossing, visually rich and almost brooding film transported the audiences on a journey of the artist and his obsession for detail, including his search for treasures in ruins and his intense labour over the creation of the frames that adorn his art.

Kolkata and his abiding love for the memories spent with his mother formed the leitmotif of the film, leaving many things inconclusive, like an unfinished poem, a bit like the bewitching art he conjures and manifests, that opens new windows of contemplation.

The writer is an independent contributor