Last Friday I went to the Little Magazine Fair at Town Hall. The Fair was held over the abandoned Tennis court in front of the Hall. An innovative stage was erected under an old banyan tree, close to the gate. Its hanging roots were used as the multiple pillars of the stage. So brilliant an idea. Yet so natural.
I came across the man who designed the stage. He is Shyamol da; Shyamol Baron Saha, a painter and a poet; an enduring name in cultural space of Burdwan and Kolkata. Affable and amiable. Smile is hardly missing from his well-shaven face. As we started conversing, a city-bred man, wearing a silky Baul-robe, tried to test his lung power with a massive, messy, vocal blast before the mouthpiece from the stage, which the announcer made us believe that it was a Baul song.
We avoided the Fair place and came to the back of the Hall overlooking a lush green field. We sat on a block of steps coming down from a height, from an old door. There are several blocks of steps off a row of such doors.
An old man came wearing a full-sleeve brown sweater. He sat right next to our block of stairs. Stretching his leg, he took out his mobile phone from his trouser pocket. He held it close to his ear in the manner of attending to an urgent call.
Painting can be so real, sometimes even more real than what meets the eye. Shyamol da said.
“ Hothat khelar sheshe aj ki dekhi chhobi…” a strain of Rabindrasangeet floated in. I turned and realized that the old man was listening to a song from his mobile.
Snatches of laughter kept alive the other side of the field where a group of youths was making their presence felt.
I looked at the old man. I failed to see him properly in the fading lights except an outline of a face intensely listening to –“After the sudden end of the game, what do I see?/ The sky ceases, silent are the sun and moon..”
The pre-winter afternoon was economical with light, as usual.