The Harvest Of What Remains

Debjani Das

Interview by L. Valena

November 11, 2022

Can you start by describing the prompt that you responded to?

The prompt sent to me was poetry with elements of prose, called The Harvest of What Remains. There were bits and pieces within it that made me decide what exactly I wanted to present. I read the piece about 15 or 20 times. The first thing that really struck me was "pick yourself up from wherever you have fallen to the ground." I come from an Indian background, and I've seen some songs or dances where there is a particular movement of pulling yourself up. I decided that would be the central piece of my response. The next thing was a line about crabapple trees, so I knew that somewhere I had to place foliage from a crabapple tree. The next point was the line, "From the harvest of what remains— ginger golds, ambers, russets, crimsons", which describes the colors of the warm palette. So I decided I would keep the colors mostly warm, and keep the Autumn foliage imagery. Then there was a point about a screen door, so I thought I would include a door.

I drew my first diagram, which had a lady coming out, and I put a square door with some question marks. But because I introduced the element of a flowy structure, a sudden geometric structure would have clashed. So I redrew the diagram divided by a crabapple tree. One side of it is in a warm tone, and the other side is in dark or receding tones, to represent the reprieves, the wonders, the squanders, and the "pulp of sorrow." She's coming up into the harvest of remaining. At the end of it, I'm trying to show some positivity.

Can you say more about how you went from reading the prompt to deciding how to respond?

Mainly by breaking down the poem, and trying to understand the essence of what it says. The first few times I read it, I was trying to assess the overall meaning. What is it trying to convey? My cognitive ability would help me to read a piece in English, and understand at a high level what it is representing. It's not very easy, because English poems aren't easy. I can completely say that someone else can read this and get a completely different meaning from it. I read it first to decide whether I wanted to take the positivity from it. That after the harvest, someone is trying to pick themselves up. After the harvest, what remains... Even if you're having a lot of sorrow, you can stand to the positivity and whatever remains with it.

I love that – it reminds me of the question about any given thing that happens in life. Is it part of the constant coming and going or is it part of what abides? What stays with us no matter what? Change often brings some degree of grief, but it feels comforting to remember that some things abide.

Yes, that consistency, that's what remains. You have ups and downs, and what remains is our ability to bounce back. That is forever the golden truth. You put yourself back together and get back into the game. The figure is pouring sand, which represents time passing by. Constantly, you're pulling at a bit of sand and throwing it. All of the colors have a particular representation. As I mentioned, I chose warm colors because it shows positivity. And this is more like a yin yang, with the sorrows and bitterness on one side. The crabapple tree is kind of the door you can use to pick yourself up. I have represented nature as a woman. In nature, you have a storm, and in the storm you have everything fallen down. But then it regrows. So this is nature, which withstands the test of time. Also, the placement of blue is strategic. The figure looks like a flame. That burning desire is also something that remains.

This painting style is called Alpana in Bengali. I'm from the Eastern part of India, near Calcutta. We draw these round flowy designs in our houses on the floor, or on the wall in our villages. I used those patterns to create all of this detailing that you see. Initially I did a study. I laid down blocks of color, but I didn't really like it. She was also becoming really muscular. I wanted her to be more demure and vulnerable.

I think it's really cool that you're drawing from this traditional visual language. Can you say more about your relationship with that?

It's called Alpana. It's a Bengali word. It is a flowy structure that can be used to draw anything you want to depict. You can pick up a flower, an animal, but it's mostly used to depict mango patterns or paisleys. It is symmetrical or asymmetrical, but created with flowy strokes, curves, dots, and filling up areas with repeated stripes. It is traditionally done using rice paste. The women who did this traditionally used soaked rice, and made a paste of it. It was drawn with fingertips and a cotton ball. You soak the cotton ball, and when you squeeze it, a little paste will start coming into your finger, and you rotate the finger to draw the whole design.

Wow! That is amazing.

In my childhood, I would go to my father's office, and during different celebrations we would make huge artworks. For example, covering the whole floor. Mostly these are used in worship, during celebrations. We will decorate our houses, mainly the door front. I used this style to bring some native originality.

What a wonderful way to celebrate life, and the divine, and the divine playing out through life! To decorate an entire house like that. That's gorgeous.

Yes! I have a brick and mortar house, but in the villages they live in huts. The huts are decorated with these same white paintings. These days we don't do as much with the rice paste. We tend to use a kaolin clay that is soaked into water overnight. People have made it a bit more trendy by adding different colors. Yes, it's a celebration of the divine, but also an expression of your creativity.

Do you have any advice for another artist approaching this project for the first time?

I would suggest making a study before creating the final piece. See if you like it. And secondly, get some views from other people about what they get from the prompt. I didn't do that – I didn't want anybody's ideas to influence what I was thinking. But maybe taking somebody else's idea would have enriched, rather than influenced or overridden, my thought process. Ultimately, it is you who is going to create the work. The creativity is your own.

Call Number: Y94PP | Y95VA.daHa

A software lead by profession, a mixed media artist by addiction Debjani Das is from Great Britain of Indian Origin, who is passionate about South Asian folk painting style named Alpana. She lives in the UK and works in Data and Analytics division of a renowned local Bank. She is proficient in glass paintings, water colour techniques, acrylics on textiles and she finds no division or boundaries but limitless opportunities in the realm of Art and Craft in comparison to all other sectors of life.