I can still recall coming to Kolkata at the age of seven and seeing my first Durga Puja, the city alive with lights and colour, and feeling a little like Alice in Wonderland, wandering through a strange and fantastical new world.
For the following five years I lived in Kolkata, I looked forward to every Puja season. It wasn’t just the colourful lights and cheer, but the imagination and artistry of it all. Each pandal was and is like its own immersive ephemeral work of art, complete with sound and lighting, and though I could hardly see above the crowds, I found myself utterly enchanted by the Durga Puja.
Everything about it fascinated me, from the story of the powerful 10-armed goddess slaying the unslayable demon, to her creation from straw and clay in the narrow lanes of Kumartuli, to the banners of dancing lights that lined the streets and of course the unfaltering creativity of each individual pandal.
Ten years later I have returned to Kolkata, this time not just to observe the festival, but actually to document and participate in the making of a pandal while on my gap year after school. As this may be my last Puja for a while before I go to art school, I wanted to get as much out of it as possible and recreate the feeling of being Alice walking through Wonderland.
Melissa Amalir
The artist at the Sovabazar Bartala Sarbojonin Durgotsav Samiti, Debabrata Singha, has kindly allowed me to join the team working on his Puja. The theme for his pandal is the loneliness brought on by our addiction to technology and how it has affected our relationships. For him, nothing is surer that his message will be seen by thousands of diverse people as a pandal during the Durga Puja. I really like this method of making people think.
Almost everything will be handmade from wood or recycled cardboard, and the walls and ceilings drawn on and coloured with pastels. As pandals go, this one is truly a work of art.
And indeed, this year being the first year of the Puja’s Unesco status, the pandal, like many others, is referencing international works of art, in particular the works of Van Gogh. It has been great fun to spot these references, as well as others to cubism, impressionism with the occasional splattering of surrealism as the pandal has progressed. The amount of detail is truly incredible; every millimetre of the pandal has something to show and seems to reference a different artist or movement.
My role in the pandal is as a decorator. Along with two of Debabrata Singha’s art students, I make and colour accessories like sunflowers or little cardboard pigeons that will adorn the pandal, and decorate its walls with childlike doodles. It is such a joy and such a privilege to know that things I have made and drawn will be proudly on display in such a beautiful pandal, sure to be seen by so many and I truly cannot wait to see it completed.