Songs in Stone - Part One

A stone.  Dead, inert and irrelevant.  We never give much thought to them. Why should we? But when these same dead and irrelevant stones are lent the touch of an artist who molds them in the vision of his heart we are left searching for words.  This series will delve into the stories that come alive through the unlikeliest of mediums … mere stones. My inspiration for this series was the magnificent sculpture of Queen Victoria at Kolkata’s Victoria Memorial.

If there was any way to drive home the majesty and finality of Her Royal Highness’s Raj over India it was this. The Memorial itself is bold statement of the Raj’s power and influence, so blatantly communicated through the museum and the innumerable statues and busts of key Raj figures of the Age. And all this so very,very  cleverly covered up in the Indo – Saracenic style with Mughal elements.

Quite frankly I find it hard to believe that the Taj Mahal itself was not the invisible itch behind this statement of British assertion, that monument of love which became the emblem of the Mughal rule. Indeed the infamous Lord Curzon who commissioned the memorial on the occasion, or as I think the pretext of Victoria’s death was never known for his magnanimity.  But the beauty of the marble façade not only takes your breath away, it also erases from your memory the vicious,raven nature of Curzonshahi. One of the cruelest reigns by any Lord in our colonial past.

As you beseech Curzon’s awe inspiring form in stone and the dreaminess of the Memorial surrounded by the gardens and the lake , you will be fooled into thinking and feeling the beauty and grace of the British Raj as set in mere stones. And you will be deafened to the echoes and cries of the countless countrymen who were driven to hunger and death by the very man and regime who so very shrewdly camouflaged their reality in a song of stone.   

When stones sing ….