‘I like to take risks’: Atul Dodiya

Atul Dodiya, one of the country’s leading artists, is known for seeking inspiration from popular culture namely, Hindi cinema, and deftly fusing them in his works. Case in point is his 1994 self-portrait, The Bombay Buccaneer, where he used oil, acrylic, and wood on canvas to portray himself as a Bollywood godlike hero in a spoof of Baazigar’s poster. A decade later, he immortalised Anil Kapoor threatening to kiss Sridevi in Roop Ki Rani Choron Ka Raja, where the former grabs the latter’s cheeks, scaring her, in his work Devi and the Sink. Now, the celebrated artist, who is having an exhibition after eight years in the city, pays homage to filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock. The show titled Seven Minutes of Blackmail opened at Mumbai’s Chemould Prescott Road gallery last week. 

In this exhibition, he captures several scenes from the maverick director-producer’s 1929 black-and-white film Blackmail on to his canvas. The end result is such that the 36 paintings resemble a film screen when placed next to each other. At first glance, they appear like vintage photographs, but once you look closer, you realise these are paintings, bathed in sepia tones.

FOR THE LOVE OF CINEMA

Talking about what appealed to him about the classic movie, Atul says, “I’m a great Hitchcock fan. I had been watching his movies since a long time and saw this film eight years ago. In 2017, when I was watching it again, I was intrigued by it. The story is about a girl, Alice White,  who meets an artist, Mr Crewe and what follows that meeting. Though the plot revolves around her, the painter is the catalyst. He invites her to his studio and she agrees to go as she is fascinated by the process of how an artist works and wants to learn more about it. But he forces himself upon her and in the struggle that ensues, she kills him accidentally. From the time, she enters his studio till the time she leaves, it spans 17 minutes in the film. I have captured the scenes spanning these minutes on the canvas, hence, the name of my exhibition.”

Atul, who turns 60 today, adds that two factors about the thriller, Blackmail, appealed to him— firstly, Hitchcock’s great visual sense and secondly, the fact that the movie was about an artist. He elaborates, “The way the filmmaker structured his narratives by close-ups, materials, objects, shadows and lights is something that I enjoyed watching tremendously. I wondered to myself that cinema is one discipline and if I allow it to permeate in another discipline, which is painting, how would it look.”

FROM CELLULOID TO CANVAS

The JJ School of Art alumnus reveals that he had to keep in mind several factors while creating these works such as how could he create a narrative by converting the film stills to oil painting, how much he should stay closer to the photorealism and how could he achieve the black-and-white tonality. 

Atul started off by clicking a lot of pictures while watching the murder mystery. The main challenge was to capture the gestures, which were quite fast on screen, on to the canvas. He states, “While painting I had to think about the intricacies of the scene, what kind of angle I wanted for Alice, the heroine and Mr Crewe, the artist. So, I selected one image, and then started painting it. I added more layers to it in the same black-and-white tonality. I moved the brush fast so that it appeared as if the artwork was depicting some kind of motion. Then, I added thin black layers to lend it a sepia tone.”

Apart from these 36 paintings, five large palette paintings and three cabinets feature in the show, too. Emphasising on the importance of palettes to create an artwork, Atul mentions, “Earlier, painters would use the wooden palette, which figures prominently in the movie too. For me, this board where I mix paints and create new colours is the place where abstraction takes birth. It’s the base for another precise design which we see on a canvas. In an exhibition or at a gallery, we always see the finished product, but no one thinks about the palette, where the interplay of colours takes place. It is witness to the tension, the anxiety that the artist goes through during his process of creativity. So, I thought of depicting them in the exhibition, too, in an abstract way. I always like to do things differently and allow myself to engage with new ideas.”

One of the centrepieces of this show is a massive cabinet that the award-winning artist has created. “There was some leftover plywood that I had got to create the palettes. So, I thought making a life-sized cabinet out of it, so that it almost looks like art deco,” he mentions.

The wooden structure is adorned with objects as well as painted images that allude to the struggle between the girl and the artist in the film. Atul describes, “The reverse glass painting in black and white gives out a clear message of yes and no and consent. Alice is very clear in saying no, but Mr Crewe still insists on going ahead. Then, there is a rooster that denotes male aggression. The handprint smeared in blood shows that she has committed a murder and is trying to escape. I love to create artworks that I can own. I wanted to go closer to Hitchcock’s style of filmmaking. I like to take risks, I’m not afraid of trying out new things.”

Quiz him how pertinent is this exhibition in the wake of the #MeToo Movement, especially since both highlight the importance of consent and Atul observes, “It’s just sheer coincidence that I created these works during this movement. However, it’s painful for a person who has been forced into something without their consent. Moreover, it also shows a lot about the other person (the man) who is abusing his power. This isn’t the right thing at all.”

Atul Dodiya built this wall-sized cabinet comprising objects that have references to the movie

WHAT WAS BLACKMAIL ABOUT?

The 1929 film was Alfred Hitchcock’s first sound movie. The story starts off with Alice White (Anna Ondra) having a row with her boyfriend Detective Frank Webber (John Longden) while out on a date. They separate, and Alice meets up with an artist Mr Crewe (Cyril Ritchard). She follows him to his home to see his studio, and he attempts to rape her. Alice kills Crewe in self-defence, and Frank is assigned to the case. Alice and Frank are then blackmailed by an eyewitness Tracy (Donald Calthrop). Hitchcock apparently revisited this film to seek inspiration for his 1954 famous thriller Dial M for Murder. Both the movies show a sexual assault in an apartment, with the victim killing her attacker in self-defence.