"She walks in beauty"

The sari prices ranged from Tk 2,000 to Tk 6,000 and if they caught the fancy of my fair lady, these painted saris had surely won the hearts of the person in the family who held the purse strings. With their artistic and individual touches, the saris presented the figures with lotus eyes, cupid lips, statuesque figures and shimmering and luminous jewellery, along with a pantheon of grand and carefully done portrayal of smiling nature, including flora and fauna, done with immaculate precision, to the last detail and beyond. Each piece was like flowing of the fountain of youth with the amazingly poetic images and the beauteous images taken from the pages of ancient poetry.

Speaking about herself, Kamrun Nahar said that after her BFA from the Fine Arts Institute, she held a number of solo exhibits and participated in joint painting displays in Dhaka with her Oriental type paintings as well as her landscapes in places like "La Galerie". She has been working as a commercial artist , but has never abandoned her more creative work. She does this, she said, after her office hours, in the evening, and works far into the night till 2am and beyond. This, Kamrun Nahar said, was due to her inner urge to be more creative than what she can be as a commercial artist making posters, leaflets, cover designs etc, which naturally brings in a steady income to supplement that of her hard-working and dedicated husband. "I don't believe that women are really compelled to give up fine arts with domestic pressure after marriage, in Dhaka or elsewhere in Bangladesh," said Kamrun Nahar, "Of course, one has to have a supportive husband and a set of understanding- in-laws. One of the many reasons why I married the man of my choise was because I knew that he would value my talent and allow me to continue to paint, which I've been doing since my childhood, for as long as I can remember."

Gorgeous, graceful and gala, the beige saris with their eye-catching motifs that hark back to the ancient poetry of the East and Middle East, and which have become and integral part of our tradition, Kamrun Nahar's saris were indeed "vraiment magnifiques". The paintings on silk were subtle, sophisticated and something new for the "begum's" wardrobe and also for younger debutantes. They were meant for the age range from 15 to 65, going by their muted backdrop and subtle use of only the "anchal", border and a part of the silk leading up to the end of the sari at times, for the dramatic delineation of our rich romantic past.

Kamrun Nahar has herself always been enamoured with the depiction of beauteous creature with doe eyes, full lips, hair like a poet's dream and long, lithe limbs , as one has seen in her paintings over the years, and which she admits herself. She is also totally fascinated with the wonderful nature that abounds in our countryside and elsewhere in parts of the world. "Man is an integral part of nature and that is why I have brought in the flowers and animals, along with human forms" she said, with her eyes -- like limpid pools -- shining with satisfaction, and dimpling demurely over her work . She has also had the fascination for bringing in minute details of oriental jewellery which the subjects had been adorned with, which are an inseparable part of Oriental Art; and which Kamrun Nahar said, had always been dear to her heart from the outset, although she did not pursue formal training in Oriental Art at the Fine Arts Institute. However, what appears to be naturally gifted, is surely adequate for her to swim the vast seas of her professional goal.

Going over some of the samples of the rare collection of saris at "La Galerie," one came across the "anchal" painted with a delectable female form, with a swishing skirt, orange and bordered with gold , and "kanchuli" which was a dotted tangerine one. She sported an "orna" which had yellow dots on blue. "These had the theme from Kalidas," Kamrun Nahar said. The other women, along with the main characters, had cascading jet-black hair, wee waists, voluptuous bosoms, and details of facial features that were nonpareil, as have gone down in history, as in the caves of Ajanta and Elora, and in innumerable Indian temples, apart from Rajput and Mogul paintings. The magical, bewitching charm of eastern women had surely been captured for all time on Kamrun Nahar's saris.

The Rubbayats of Omar Khayyam, too had their detailed delineation, with the theme of wine, woman and song put in wondrous delightful manner. The paintings were not mere illustrations but had personal touches which set them apart from other paintings found anywhere else. The fact that they were on saris, which could be worn both at day and night because of the subtle choice of colours on the soft caressing background was something that made one speechless.

One left the exhibition with total admiration, and with the unsatisfied desire to have done one's Eid shopping later on in the month, and so could have probably fitted in at least one of the superb silk saris for someone dear to oneself. Let's hope Kamrun Nahar repeats her performance some time in the near future: once more with feeling.