‘Prabha Atre’ instead of ‘B Prabha’?

A painting exhibition is being held in a luxurious club in Delhi. Right from Hussain to Kolte, the paintings of all eminent artists have been displayed in this exhibition. But in the exhibition brochure that has been released by the organizers, instead of the painter B Prabha, photograph of renowned singer Prabha Atre of Kirana Gharana has been published. The whole thing is literally mind-boggling. This special article addresses this matter.

After a painter passes away, what exactly happens to their paintings, their studio, their house, their collection of books, is a subject that constantly torments me. The instances of this sort are so heart wrenching that sometimes even their remembrance seems unpleasant. Just to make the point clear, I would like to cite only two or three examples, from which you will understand exactly what I mean.

When a renowned portrait artist passed away, someone in his relatives or close family members packed all his paintings in sacks and either dumped them in the garbage bin or sold them to the scrap dealer. The sack was so full that one or two of the paintings spilled out of the sack on the way. A student of the dead artist happened to see those and then the news broke and became the talk of the town.

Second example is similar one. After the death of the President’s Medal winning painter, his collection of books was burgled along with the closet. His paintings were sold at the price per kilogram. And the photo album was sold in a junk shop. It also had a photograph of him receiving the President’s Award. This news also spread like wildfire.

The third example is that after the demise of the painter, the clippings of newspapers and weekly magazines collected by him were thrown away into the trash. The entire history of Indian painting and modern art were compiled in that collection, filled in a sack almost as tall as a man. But it eventually it was reduced to pulp.

No one took documentation seriously. Neither art education institutes, nor art societies. So did the art colleges. They also never took this matter seriously. That’s why the art scholars are literally in trouble while writing the history of Indian painting. The reason to have reminded of all this today is a forward sent by a friend on WhatsApp.

A painting exhibition is going on at DISCOVER Collection Club in Delhi’s Chanakyapuri area. The exhibition showcases the paintings of Hussain, Krishen Khanna, Ramkumar, Ramkinkar Baij, Raza, Suryaprakash, SG Vasudev, Satish Gupta, Manu Parekh, Jogen Chowdhury, J Swaminathan and two Marathi artists Prabhakar Kolte and B Prabha.

The forwarded message does not mention Who has coordinated this exhibition or who has written the catalogue of this exhibition. So it is a fact that nothing can be said about it. But there is a very terrible mistake in the catalog or brochure whatever you may call it. That is, in place of the famous woman painter B Prabha’s photo, the catalogue writers or the designers or the exhibition coordinators have given a photograph of renowned classical singer Prabha Atre of Kirana Gharana. Such a terrible mistake it is!

Artists devote entire life for their art practice and when they get old or pass away, any Tom, Dick and Harry mock art by making such terrible mistake, without any study. What the artists or their relatives must be feeling? Even their fans like me are shocked to see all this, then what must be the artists themselves or their relatives must be feeling? Prabha Atre is around 91 today. Currently lives in Pune. Even today she is dedicated to classical music with the same passion. She has been decorated with all the music awards in India. Not only this, but in the year 1990, Government of India honored her with the Padam Shri award. Not only this, she was recently honored with the Padma Bhushan award. Mentioning such prominent artist wrongly in place of another artist or printing their photo in place of another artist in a different field is very cruel or threatening. It is a terrible mischief done to those artists. But it is really surprising that those who did this act seem to completely unaware of it.

B Prabha devoted her entire life to painting. She practiced painting every day for years. She was actively working till the end. After her death, printing a photo of another artist from a different field in her place is very unfair to both artists. And it is even more unfortunate that all this should happen in the capital of India. Many of the painters who have participated in that exhibition are alive. None of them could inform the organizers about this is really surprising.

I had very brief interactions with B Prabha. She used to be constantly engaged in her work. They were constantly working. At such a time, I used to feel that it was not right to bother her and I even hesitated, thinking why should I take the time of such a great artist? But in connection with the matters of the Bombay Art Society, I used to talk to her husband B Vitthal regularly for some reason or another. He used to talk about his work very openly freely. He used to narrate in lucid detail how he reached this position. He had planned to do a lot. Just to give an example, he had acquired many acres of land near the famous temple of Vajreshwari. Many means a few hundred acres or so. And he had a brilliant idea of making plots there and giving those to artists.

But none of that materialized. Unfortunately, both of them passed away. They had no children so no one ever came to know what happened to their luxurious flat at Colaba, their studio and Art Gallery at Nariman Point. In other countries, places of such artists, and their memories are preserved. But here we simply destroy the remnants of their achievements. In doing so, the very own relatives of the artists are no exception, then what to say about strangers?

This is exactly what happened with B Prabha. In that, Google has made these entries recklessly. Those concerned or art scholars need to rectify these errors urgently. But who cares? It is possible that the organizers have made this mistake due to Google. But isn’t it the duty of the organizers to give proper or accurate information about the artist whose painting you are going to sell for lakhs of rupees? Now that we’ve all butted our heads, are you going to amend it? Or are you going to conveniently blame it on Google?

Satish Naik

Editor, Chinha Art News

Note: The photo of B. Prabha in this article is from Art of India 2023 collection of Times of India. The photo is Prrabha Atre is from various sources as mentioned in captions.