11/22/2024
Somenath Maity is one of India’s, life time achievement award winning artist.
Somenath’s paintings are a rhapsodic account of his ever expanding journey in life. Belonging from the rural Bengal, Somenath spent his entire childhood in Darua a beautiful costal village situated near the bay of Bengal. As a child, his adventures ranged from the farmlands to the Sea beaches. Somenath’s life changed when his strict father allowed him to move to Kolkata and continue his passion for studying Visual Arts.
To Somenath’s surprise Kolkata was more than just an over populated, concrete jungle of buildings. It was quite the opposite with a rich heritage and culture of once the capital of British ruled India. Vintage buildings with Victorian aesthetics, busy interesting streets filled with people of various ethnicity and race. Most importantly the city itself had a heart of it's own which is evident till date. Somenath was overwhelmed and clueless at the same time, when he suddenly got prodigious teachers and acquaintances equally ambitious. His journey in the arts began when, he met eminent Indian Artist Shuvaprassana Bhattacharya and asked him to be his mentor. Shuvaprassan helped him understand the aspects of modern art world and taught him how to think beyond the mediocre art practice. Somenath got admission to his private institution while continuing his diploma course at the Indian college of Art and Draftsmanship. As a student he spent most of his time drawing large artworks, as large as 20 feet in pen and ink. He now works in acrylic on Canvas.
By the time he was about to graduate as an artist, he started to develop an obsession with the nocturnal city scapes. Street lights and glistering urban constructions a rather foreign element to his childhood scenes. This got him awestruck yet subsequently linking it with the fireflies in the farmlands he saw in growing up . The city lights would blend with the stars that was still same as he would see them in his now so distant childhood would make me nostalgic and transcend him to a never ending fantasy, a fiction of light and darkness, hope within misery.
Somenath has had many solo and group exhibition all over India, UK, Sweden, Germany, Singapore, Japan and USA.
You can see Somenath’s artwork in the collections of
National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi. Lalitkala Academy, New Delhi.Fukuoka Museum, Japan.Hindustan Lever Ltd., Mumbai. N.C.E.R.T., New Delhi.
Tata Tea, Calcutta, Munner.
Gujrat Heavy Chemicals, New Delhi. Birla Academy of Art & Culture, Calcutta, Taj Hotel, Mumbai.
B.M. Birla Science Centre, Hyderabad.
Hilton Hotel, Bangalore
Taj Hotel, Chennai and many private collections in India and abroad.
Somenath has received the many awards in India, he has received a life time achievement award from West Bengal Govt.cultural dept. On 22.11.22, Kolkata.