One of the roles that an artist plays is to distill his reactions to stimulus, sharpen them and then exhibit rather than regurgitate whatever he feels." Shakti Maira doesn't believe in an artist `conveniently vomiting out every uncrystallised feeling and dumping it' onto the viewer. He has gone through a host of experiences along with the practice of Buddhist meditation and is back in India, after a two-year hiatus, to show the influence of these adventures upon his works.

As a child, Shakti's talents were recognised by his parents and he was given carte blanche to paint on any surface of the house, be it cupboards, walls, flower pots and even glasses. At Mayo College, his gift was given further impetus. However, after school his love for art was set aside in favour of the archetypal graduation-MBA-bank job routine. Then one day his job with Citibank took him to the Philippines. Seduced by the exotic localesthere, like Gaugain was by Tahiti, he decided to chuck it all up for a more interesting life at Lintas. Run by theatre personalities Alyque Padamsee and Gerson da Cunha, he rediscovered his love for art and had five solo shows at the Taj Art Gallery from 1973 onward.

Then he went to America to introduce the "unimaginative American" to Indian craft "for the true art of our country lies in its craft". And then as luck would have it, he was approached by the World Bank to go to Sri Lanka. Presenting an opportunity to learn meditation. And a chance to find the definition of his muse.

Shakti's works have nearly always been about the human mind. At one stage he used the landscape as a metaphor for the human mind. The parched land was the mind thirsting for enlightenment. In 1997, the Japanese art of screen making was used to show the two different aspects of meditation. His latest exhibition, `Multiple Strands' -- done over two years -- again attempts to understand the human mind, through Buddhism. "I think ittranscends cultures and nationalities. The eastern perspective has a great relevance in the West and I see myself as a person who shows the cultural window." A reflective series, his works are about his experiences with Buddhism and the "Bodhi" form, which comes from Buddhist symbolic imagery, representing the enlightened mind. He has explored this form by playing with the shape and probing alternate representations.

The works exhibited are priced at Rs 6,000 onward and include prints. "Unfortunately in India there is an ignorance about prints. They are looked on as reproductions and not as individual and unique ways to interpret art through etchings, colography, monotypes etc."

To illustrate his point, Shakti is holding a workshop for children on October 16, where a Husain print will be worked on and re-imaged by the children.

-- NISHA JAMWAL

`Multiple Strands', at the Fine Art Company, Raheja Chambers, Linking Rd, Santacruz (W). From Oct 15 to Oct 21. Time: 11.00 am to 7.00 pm. At theJehangir Art Gallery, Kala Ghoda. Oct 28 onward. Time: 11.00 am to 7.00 pm.