kolkata festivals and art have always mixed well holi diwali kali puja durga puja christmas have inspired artists ganesh chaturthi has even inspired a series india is a very colourful country its a melting pot of cultures communities lifestyles and food habits all this adds to the vibrancy and colours of our country this is the foundation on which festivals are organised these events are replete with colours in spices food clothing and decor and of course the resplendent gods and goddesses all this lends itself directly to art and artists are drawn naturally to transcreating festivals in their works an art market source told et among the top artists in india who have churned out works on festivals is mf husain who has created paintings around holi and diwali bikash bhattacharjee has also focused on these two festivals raja ravi verma and jogesh seal have depicted diwali in some of their paintings while subroto gangopadhyay has painted on holi fn souza jamini roy and badri narayan have depicted christ and christmas in some of their paintings paresh maity has recently done a series on kerala in which he has also worked around the festivals and the dances that accompany them durga puja in west bengal ganesh chaturthi in maharashtra or jagannath festival can rate with any festival in the world in terms of scale grandeur and participation they are apt for artistic interpretation it is no wonder then that artists have come forward to churn out paintings on them the source saidof late watercolour artist swaroop mukerji has worked exhaustively on ganesh chaturthi mukerji spent a couple of weeks in mumbai working on almost all major ganesh idols in the region the idols were painted in different stages in of their making he has painted them in watercolour mixed media conte and pen and ink on paperthe result is a mix of 30 paintings in the four media representing different ganapatis in their varied moods the works will be showcased in a preview in kolkata and then travel to mumbai in the runup to ganesh chaturthi