The work, Intercourse is a simple structure of a house with a transparent net, instead of walls, hung on the back and the front. And on each side of this material, an outline of a man and a woman, who are holding an eye out to each other, has been stitched by Suresh himself. The work isa statement on the complexity of intimate relationships. "Offering an eye is about letting another person enter into your world, about shedding your skin," he says. The net denotes transparency, a situation of being both a spectator and a performer, which arises when two people are so close. A coil of rope hangs down and falls into a heap from a huge wooden comma protruding through the roof. While the rope is used by Suresh to bring in the linear element that he misses from his painting, here it becomes a metaphor for complications in an intimate relationship. The comma-like structure is a tender shoot coming up from the house, as a symbol of growth and fertility.

Inside the house, there is a white sewing machine next to which lies a roll of a bright orange thread. A colour which you cannot escape from in Suresh's work just like you cannot escape it in real life. Here it speaks about how communal differences also translate into private ones, a subject that the city might be familiar with through SunilShanbagh's sensitive play Do Quame. The colour turns up again, insidiously, in Crescent Boat, which has gilt-edged empty picture frames in one corner of the wooden boat facing a heap of saffron powder sitting inside a mouse trap. The reference to Husain is obvious but Suresh doesn't state it, only saying that communal forces attempt to suppress freedom of expression. In Studytable -- Homage to Tensing, the rope appears again as a linear element, but since it is a tribute to the man who might have been the first to conquer the Everest, its presence is apt. This installation has a window frame on one side of the study table, a nostalgic feel of school days spent staring out of the window, and a jagged white wall standing immovable in front of the desk. The hole on the desk is a reference to the pedantic education system that we have all suffered from -- where most of the knowledge being imparted just gets lost. Also a statement on the increasing materialism of ambition as opposed toTensing's iron-will determination to achieve something of substance.

It is here perhaps that the only weakness in Suresh's works pops up. There are too many statements being made in the same little space and this overlapping tends to fuzz the communication process. For instance, his stitching on net, which appears in other works besides Intercourse is an attempt to breakdown boundaries between activities which are slotted as male/female. Titles of some of his works also refer to Panchatantra or Jataka tales as in Plastic/Sour Grapes where a bunch of plastic, purple grapes represent environmental pollution to him besides an attempt by middle classes to ape higher standards of living. He gives his works an antique feel, accentuated by upholstery material whose print has a very turn-of-the-century look. This is an ironic statement on people who have cultivated an unbiased fetish for antique stuff -- doesn't matter if the aesthetics suck, only the foolish, pompous pride of ownership hasto be sated. All this is knitted intricately into his work. But this gap of understanding is quickly covered if you speak to Suresh about his art. He has a radar-sensitive mind which picks up trends, social or political, very keenly and the metaphors he uses to communicate those have a lot of strength. His works are a tapestry of trends and reflections, and to truly appreciate, like any other intricate weaving, they require close attention. At Gallery Chemould, 1st Floor, Jehangir Art Gallery.

Till November 7, 1998. Time: 11.00 am to 7.00 pm.