On canvas, captured essence of Punjab
Chandigarh
“Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.” Henry Ward Beecher
Saint artist, artist of the divine, painter of the people … whichever way you care to remember the legendary artist Sobha Singh there is no denying here was an artist, pure in body, mind and soul. Spirituality defined his being and his paintings.
Born on November 29, 1901, at Sri Hargobindpur in Gurdaspur district, Punjab, he specialised in art and craft in an Industrial School in Amritsar and later served as a draftsman in the Army, posted in Baghdad. But he soon returned to his calling of painting, even though initially he was dissuaded by his father to follow arts as a vocation. A brief stint in Amritsar, Delhi and Lahore during which he even ventured into filmmaking and made a film called ‘But Tarash’, he found his real home in the lap of nature in Andretta in the Kangra Valley. It was here that he designed and set up his studio, today being looked after by his grandson Hriday Paul Singh. If his motto, “Grow More Food,” is writ on the wall of his studio, Emerson, Krishnamurthi and Khalil Gibran were food for his mind. Always impeccably attired, his admirers, including his disciple RM Singh, were taken in by his ethereal aura.
Nearly four decades since he passed away on August 22, 1986, his paintings of Sikh Gurus remain a referral point, an eternal guide on how the divine figures may have appeared in their physical form. The artist himself always proclaimed how he was painting the sterling qualities of the great Gurus. Thus his portrait of Guru Nanak Dev is an emblem of divinity, of Guru Gobind Singh the warrior Guru’s exceptional zeal, of Guru Harkishan as hallmark of his service to humanity.
‘Satyam Shivam Sundaram’ may be the mantra for many artists, only Sobha Singh inverted this universal truth and put ‘sundaram’ (beauty/ aesthetics) as the top requisite of art. In a world riddled with conflicts and despair, he only saw beauty and chose to paint all things beautiful. Abstraction was an anathema for him and realism remained his forte. His chosen medium was oil on canvas with which he captured the essence of Punjab through its love legends too.
In his hands, love legends like Sohni Mahiwal, Sassi Punnu acquired a life of their own volition and an inimitable emotional appeal. Sohni Mahiwal, which he painted nearly five times starting from 1937, is a classic in all its versions, as enduring in its visual appeal as the legend itself. The ‘Kangra Bride’, a picture of demureness, stands out in his vast oeuvre as do religious figures and national heroes like Mahatma Gandhi and Bhagat Singh. Among his last works was an unfinished painting of Guru Ravidas.
Whether his painting of Guru Nanak Dev is a self-portrait or not — as is sometimes debated — the artist himself confessed that when he painted Sohni Mahiwal, he put a wet cloth on himself and used the reflection on an electric heater to study the effect of water and light. Eminent artist Prem Singh who met him briefly says, “All art is self-reflection and by that logic an artist is present in all his works.”
By the artist’s own admission and despite royal patronage (among his buyers were Dr Karan Singh, the former maharaja of Jammu & Kashmir), his art was for the common man. Prints of his original paintings became an objet d'art of millions of households.
‘The most simple is the most difficult….I must paint pictures of joy…’ Sobha Singh said. A few detractors might have been dismissive of what they dubbed ‘calendar art’, but across this land his paintings remain a source of perennial joy. Ironically, although Sobha Singh did not accept former Chief Commissioner of Chandigarh MS Randhawa’s invitation to settle in the City Beautiful, he breathed his last in Chandigarh. His art, and the story of his life, will always live on.
