chetan

Chetan came to People Tree many years ago - recommended by a common friend - as a 'talented young man in need of wider exposure', from Manipur. He did pick up visualization skills and techniques of art, but also ended up giving in return to all of us some unforgettable lessons in the art of living. He has come, stayed and drifted away many times after that, but Chetan was and remains a law unto himself : brilliantly gifted, possessed of a unique vision, yet
frustratingly disorganized; essentially self-taught, supremely self confident,
yet wantonly self destructive. Life is never predictable when he is around.
He's either cooking up an emperor's feast, or playing noisily with children,
or swimming too far out at sea, or getting happily stoned…

Chetan paints - and though he does many things well, this is really his
deepest love. His paintings are like poems that can rage and whisper simultaneously. His lines, forms and colours are always aimed directly at that part of our beings that lie beyond mere sight and recognition. Those who view them either fall completely in love, or find in his work the hallucinations of a madman. Which is as it should be, for the comfortable grey zone of in-betweens does not exist in Chetan's universe.

- Orijit