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The world of art and artists, she feels, is pregnant with an alluring mystique and it this mystery deep like the darkness of night that she cares to tap into and illumine. The idea she says is "to reveal the art of the artist to people, both the common man and the connoisseur." But is writing on the same person again and again gratifying? And the author of Journey With a 100 Strings on the life of santoor maestro Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma who is preparing to bring out another on the great musician certainly thinks so. "See when my first book on Panditji was published it was to mark his 60th birthday. Now it will coincide with his 75th.. Since then he has travelled a long distance. There is continuity as well as progress which I would love to record for posterity." As a biographer, Ina views herself as a chronicler first who must negate her own self and become one with her subject. So no value judgments, no critical appraisals, her approach is largely interview-based. For an upcoming endeavour in Prague that will translate into a 15,000 word book she will get the artists to talk about themselves, something that doesn't happen often enough. Documentation, she asserts, is very vital for how else would future generations know of these artists. She reasons "Today we know of Gandhara art and miniatures for someone cared to put it down for us." She feels that time will slip between our fingers if we don't freeze it by way of the written word. On close friend and confidante the late Manjit, of course, she has not only written extensively including a voluminous work for Lalit Kala Akademi but also produced a film Meeting Manjit. Born into a family that boasted of luminaries like filmmaker Ritwik Ghatak and Jnanpith Award recipient Mahashweta Devi she was exposed to different arts in equal measure and sensed a close interface between literature, cinema and visual arts. Today, she is all agog to create a unique project based on her mausi Mahasweta Devi's Breast stories for which she has approached filmmakers as well as visual artists. She says, "An art curator not only acts as a bridge between the artist and the viewer but also opens new windows filtered by his or her vision." For instance, when she curated "Mapping the Conscious," that included Manjit's paintings on the aftermath of 1984 riots, only she was aware how deeply pained was he by the massacre of Sikhs. She recalls, "Manjit felt personally violated by the horror of genocide." A curator, she also shares, is the one who decides what, whom and how to project. So when she felt Manjit's guru Abani Sen had not got his due she came out with a show "Whispered Legacy". Though she loves to take risks and bring unknown talent to the fore she is equally gladdened by the mind-boggling success of celebrated names like Subodh Gupta, Bharti Kher and Sudarshan Shetty. She quips, "When I see India pavilion at the Venice biennale or the exhibition of modern Indian art at Centre Pompidou, France, my heart is filled with great joy and pride." The sense of pride is doubly enhanced when she comes across curators like Ranjit Hoskote, Gayatri Sinha who bring that unique Indianness to their shows. Firmly she rubbishes the contention that Indians are visually illiterate. "Indians understand art more than anyone else for art is an integral part of their lives." Yes, often their sensibilities could go into slumber. But then Ina is determined to log into their subconscious, engage them in a dialogue and communicate all that rests within the deep confines of art and artists. She quips, "Visual experience is just one layer. When I talk about the art work it should sing." Alongside she takes great pains to ensure that the mystique and the surprise element, the essential essence of art, too sustain. Fountainhead of Ina's inspiration Ina Puri who happens to be the niece of Jnanpith awardee Mahasweta Devi can't stop gushing over her mausi whom she hails as a towering banyan tree. Puri remarks, "Her presence is so inspiring that she has not only influenced me but society at large, with her integrity and honesty. She has taught me to live life at my own terms and to be unafraid."
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