Ever since the beginning of his endeavors with art; ever since he started painting watercolours as a school boy, Subodh Kerkar has always played with light in his works. He painted so many watercolours with bold shade and light effects, that his friends started calling him a ‘shady’ artist. (Actually he painted light, but most people noticed the shade). The shadows of palm leaves dancing like swords on old walls painted with layers of lime paint always fascinated him. So, it was not surprising that he tried to inculcate the play of light in his beach installations. Cone is the obvious form which emerges when one builds with sand. It is perhaps the first form every child creates on the beach. He built a lot of large sand cones with moats around them fitted with electrical bulbs. He then waited for the dusk for switching on the lights. The cones projected out of the shore, like many breasts of mother earth to put it in Freudian context. The cones which were reminders perhaps, of the motherhood of earth. As the night fell, the cones came alive. All the fire of love deep down mother earth, sprouted like breasts of ambers. Not ambers of rage, but ambers which exuded peace, tranquility. Ambers you could touch, caress, embrace ….. for you knew they are not going to hurt you. They were ambers of love. The fire of love which has arisen to prove that the earth still loves you. The cones also reminded him of pyramids. Perhaps, the pyramids of Egyptian Pharoas that traveled across the Indian ocean and are raising their heads on the beaches of Goa, in the process losing their edges and becoming cones!
