After completing his BFA at the College of Arts and Crafts, Dhaka, Bangladesh in 1969, Manuj Babu Mishra took up a government post at Janak Siksha Samagri Kendra. He later resigned the security of this post to continue his art. He felt that there was more to his life than mundane office routine. He began teaching art at the at the Lalit Kala Campus of the National Art College, in Bhotahiti, where young artists adored him. Nepal underwent political change during the 1990s, and one of the main contenders, the so-called democratic movement, promised much that was left unfulfilled. Dissatisfied and distressed by the course of events, he confined himself to within the four walls of his own home, more particularly the studio located on the ground floor of his house. This innerexile amounted to a rejection of the prevailing social and political conditions of the time, and he would spend the rest of his life as a hermit, even referring to his home as the Hermitage. Having been orphaned at a very tender age, and thus faced with considerable hardship early on in life, events would prompt a loss of faith in God that ultimately led to his embrace of atheism – decisions characteristic of a rebellious temperament. In his Hermitage he created both brilliant and grotesque works, expressive of his withdrawal from the selfish, superficial and corrupt world. This withdrawal from practical life provided him time to reflect and to give full expression to his thought and ideas. The depictions of himself in most of his paintings invariably take centre stage. He paints self-portraits, sometimes in combination with other subjects, occasionally resulting in complex compositions with broad brushstrokes depicting distorted forms and objects, such as atom bombs, rockets, and tridents in brilliant colours, predominantly in various hues of red.
Although confined to the Hermitage, Mishra kept himself informed through television and the newspapers and was very much in touch with the current events. Disturbed by the political instability and violence of the world, he painted satires of these subjects in vivid colours, with grotesque expressions and distorted forms. As he often remarked, his artworks are more ‘expressions and emotions rather than aesthetics’. In August 2018, Mishra passed away peacefully in his sleep at the age of eighty-two. His absence has left a void in Nepal’s artistic community. He welcomed everyone to his Hermitage for discussions over a cup of tea. He is widely remembered as one of the pioneers of modern art in Nepal. Mishra held his first exhibition in Dhaka, Bangladesh, where he competed his BFA in 1967, followed by many more in Nepal, India, Germany and Denmark.
Written by Swosti Rajbhandari Kayastha
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