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Sikhi Art - Essence of Warriors & Saints ~ Solo Exhibition by Bhagat Singh Bedi


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The Guru Ajran Dev ji painting has just so... so... many feelings of realism and emotions depicted in one fabulous painting. I always end up just looking,,looking..feeling..feeling ...looking again..  I've really got to hand it to you Bhagat,.. that painting speaks volumes.

My first thought is always.."Aad Guray Nameh, Jugaad guray naameh, Satgur namah, Sri guru devaih nameh"  and then the look of the hazy, smoke surrounding Guruji- which makes me feel that there is the mist or fogginess around those that cannot see Guruji for the Truth. ...But I love the way that right in the centre and nucleus of the picture, are the lighter shades and enlightened essence of Guru Arjan Dev Ji, because right there inside him is the Ultimate Truth of the Atma that is Ik-Mikh with paramatma. ...The completely untouchable satch.... You can do anything you want to Guruji's body cloth, burn it, scald, boil it....but You will NEVER hurt that Paramatma-atma inside him,,.Never.. and he knows it too well whilst sat there absorbed in meditation.................I could go on and on with some new elements and attributes every time!

His calmness, the complete relaxed and absorbed posture, and the sense of his complete disassociation to his body and surroundings.....You know this painting strikes so many different chords of emotions all in the same note. The emotions of love, connection, faith, pain, sadness and joy all rolled into one.

I applaud our Bhagat for this, and his many other magnificent pieces.

 

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23 hours ago, Lucky said:

The Guru Ajran Dev ji painting has just so... so... many feelings of realism and emotions depicted in one fabulous painting.

...

23 hours ago, Lucky said:

His calmness, the complete relaxed and absorbed posture, and the sense of his complete disassociation to his body and surroundings.....You know this painting strikes so many different chords of emotions all in the same note. The emotions of love, connection, faith, pain, sadness and joy all rolled into one.

Thanks for the kind words Lucky!

I think you put it all so wonderfully. Feels good :D

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15 hours ago, Rock said:

Bhagat,

Have you ever tried working directly with oil paints ?

Yep. Oils is what I originally started with. I have several oil paintings in my personal collection, which were painted when I was very young. Although they were on-display at the exhibit in Brampton, they can not seen in any of the photos in the sikhnet article.

Later when I grew up and went to uni, I moved to digital painting because it required neither set-up nor clean-up. It was easy to slip into after a full day at uni.

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On 2016-04-28 at 2:11 PM, Jatro said:

Wow, so beautiful. Great attention to detail too, notice Baba Banda ji's red robes

Thank you. If you notice Baba ji's turban it is a puratan dumalla from the early 1700s.

Btw I think Banda ji's choice was mostly due to the fact that the Mughals would often wear blue.

ਨੀਲ ਬਸਤ੍ਰ ਲੇ ਕਪੜੇ ਪਹਿਰੇ ਤੁਰਕ ਪਠਾਣੀ ਅਮਲੁ ਕੀਆ ॥
Wearing blue clothes, the Turks and Pathans (Muslim groups) ruled (over India).

If you look at this Sikh painting from the 1800s, it shows the Mughals or Afghanis wearing blue and the Sikhs wearing all kinds of random colours.

19th century art piece 2.jpg

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One thing that surprises me is how puratan paintings of Guru Tegh Bahadhur show him in regal dress, often with a hawk on his wrist (like we normally associate with dasmesh pita), somewhere along the line (in recent times I think) Guru Tegh Bahadhur's image changed from a regal warrior one to a more meditative one as depicted by Sobha Singh. 

703552e7826badcc816ed6db487018c1.jpg

15ed1129525d84810366ab3182373edf.jpg

 

That last one is meant to be a contemporary painting. 

 

052c726888699b338b1ba26ef455cf07.jpg

 

Why the change??

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31 minutes ago, dalsingh101 said:

One thing that surprises me is how puratan paintings of Guru Tegh Bahadhur show him in regal dress, often with a hawk on his wrist (like we normally associate with dasmesh pita), somewhere along the line (in recent times I think) Guru Tegh Bahadhur's image changed from a regal warrior one to a more meditative one as depicted by Sobha Singh. 

703552e7826badcc816ed6db487018c1.jpg

15ed1129525d84810366ab3182373edf.jpg

 

That last one is meant to be a contemporary painting. 

 

052c726888699b338b1ba26ef455cf07.jpg

 

Why the change??

Maybe because of the nature of his Bani which is extremely Vairaag-mayi?

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51 minutes ago, Jatro said:

Maybe because of the nature of his Bani which is extremely Vairaag-mayi?

Okay, but I do find it strange that artists didn't pick up and develop previously existing images and totally recreated the iconography. It might simply be that Sobha Singh's work has come to form the pervading image for the Sikh masses as he was so successful and popular as an artist?

I think another reason might be that later Sikhs focused on Guru ji's later reclusive period (just prior to getting Gurgaddi). When 9th mahal was young he was involved in the early Sikh battles as a young man (hence the change of name from Tyag Maal to Tegh Bahadhur - the brave sword).

The puratan imagery above seems to reflect the 'brave sword' conception more than the vairaagi.

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9 hours ago, dalsingh101 said:

I think another reason might be that later Sikhs focused on Guru ji's later reclusive period (just prior to getting Gurgaddi).

It wasn't for a brief period. He was very good swordsman at a young age but basically as he entered his prime he became a vairagi and remained that way for the rest of his life. Wiki says it was about 26 years prior to Gurgaddi that he spent mostly in meditation.

 

9 hours ago, dalsingh101 said:

Okay, but I do find it strange that artists didn't pick up and develop previously existing images and totally recreated the iconography.

Modern sikhs and sikh artists are very disconnected from their ancient history.

That's one of the things that I have tried to do differently from the current trend is go back to our ancient history and beliefs as clearly, purely as possible.

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9 hours ago, paapiman said:

Bro, Turks and Pathans used to wear sky blue clothes (please see below), not dark blue (the common color for Nihang Singhs).

They wore dark blue. Dark blue (indigo) dye was very easy to obtain in India. However it was unavailable anywhere else. So the Turks (muslim groups), Angrez, Egyptians and others were fascinated by it, for them it was a luxury, for Hindus it was a commonly available dye. So they wore it more often due to their attraction for it, whereas we didn't care about it as much since it was so common for us.

Very rarely do puratan paintings show Guru Sahibs wearing Indigo dyed clothes.

 

Wiki

Indigo was used in India, which was also the earliest major center for its production and processing.[3] The I. tinctoria species was domesticated in India.[3] Indigo, used as a dye, made its way to the Greeks and the Romans, where it was valued as a luxury product.[3]

Indigo is among the oldest dyes to be used for textile dyeing and printing. Many Asian countries, such as India, China, Japan, and Southeast Asian nations have used indigo as a dye (particularly silk dye) for centuries. The dye was also known to ancient civilizations in Mesopotamia, Egypt, Britain, Mesoamerica, Peru, Iran, and Africa.

India is believed to be the oldest center of indigo dyeing in the Old World. It was a primary supplier of indigo to Europe as early as the Greco-Roman era. The association of India with indigo is reflected in the Greek word for the dye, indikón (ινδικόν, Indian). The Romans latinized the term to indicum, which passed into Italian dialect and eventually into English as the word indigo.

 

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Quote

Very rarely do puratan paintings show Guru Sahibs wearing Indigo dyed clothes.

This one is interesting. It's supposed to be a contemporary painting of dasmesh pita from an old Dasam Granth bir:

 

gurupaintingdasam.jpg

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15 hours ago, BhagatSingh said:

Thank you. If you notice Baba ji's turban it is a puratan dumalla from the early 1700s.

Btw I think Banda ji's choice was mostly due to the fact that the Mughals would often wear blue.

ਨੀਲ ਬਸਤ੍ਰ ਲੇ ਕਪੜੇ ਪਹਿਰੇ ਤੁਰਕ ਪਠਾਣੀ ਅਮਲੁ ਕੀਆ ॥
Wearing blue clothes, the Turks and Pathans (Muslim groups) ruled (over India).

If you look at this Sikh painting from the 1800s, it shows the Mughals or Afghanis wearing blue and the Sikhs wearing all kinds of random colours.

19th century art piece 2.jpg

Did Baba Banda Singh jee Bahadur wore red clothes? Red and Green are forbidden colors for the Khalsa. Dark Blue has a special significance in Sikhism. Please have a look below.

 

 

Bhul chuk maaf

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On 2016-04-30 at 5:23 PM, dalsingh101 said:

This one is interesting. It's supposed to be a contemporary painting of dasmesh pita from an old Dasam Granth bir:

Yep that's the one I was talking about.

Here's another one of Guru Gobind Singh ji that was painted during late 1600s. It is said to have existed in Guru Sahib's own collection.

Notice the Dumalla shape, notice the yellow farla, notice the ear-rings and notice that hair.

These are also seen in paintings of Guru Hari Krishan ji that were painted during 1800s.

10599722_936107449733229_8562700260320282246_n.jpg

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