Sharbamangala – Kolkata artist’s artwork for ICU COVID patient creates miracle

In what is one of the most endearing stories of friendship and love to come out this festive season, one of Bengal's most talented visual artists Oiendrila Ray Kapur has created a stunning art work of Goddess Durga as a way to pray for the life of her best friend's mother who was fighting in the ICU for nearly two months after being struck by COVID-19. Feeling helpless as Debjani Sinha’s health kept sinking as she lay in a COVID ICU for weeks, Oiendrila immersed herself in creating an artwork and pray in her own way to the divine for a miracle to happen. For a patient on whom most had given up to return home. Just like the homecoming of Devi Durga

And out of the blue that did happen. Oiendrila’s friend, well-known photographer and journalist Kounteya Sinha had long back gifted her from Kumartuli, the mud faces of Maa Durga. In this Bengal’s famous potter’s hub at times such faces are seen lying around, some are abandoned as the potters create many faces at a time, and a small defect means abandoning them. The mud faces of the Mother Goddess who is considered to be protecting us all came handy. Oiendrila decided to create an artwork and keep praying to the Divine Mother. She spent over 264 hours creating the magnum opus. Almost 12 feet high art installation using the faces and Chandan or Sandalwood paste as dots. It felt almost like adorning a new bride. “Every time I put a dot – I prayed hard for Sinha's discharge from the hospital, though hope was sinking with every passing day.”

But it’s said miracles do happen and at times they happen out of the blue. The 64-year-old lady finally survived and was discharged from hospital after a gruelling 37-days in the ICU of Kolkata’s Woodlands Hospital. Oiendrila not only heaved a sigh of relief, but decided to start her first Durga Puja at her home in South Kolkata for all of the city to be part of, as a way to say ‘Thank You’ to the Goddess for her blessings and returning a life from the jaws of death.

The mind boggling art work, which has taken thousands of dots to create, is her idol. As Oiendrila put in: “I want this to be Shobar Puja or Everyone’s Celebration. Every person from Kolkata can be a part of it.” Thus the name ‘Sharbamangala’ after the name of Goddess Durga which literally means ‘The One who is the Auspiciousness in All the Auspicious and one who fulfils all the objectives of her devotees - Dharma, Artha, Karma and Moksha.’

 
Ray Kapur is a graduate in Visual Communication and Design from the globally renowned Ravensbourne College of Design and Communication in London. She says: “The entire process for me was a prayer. I used to wake up in the morning, switch on the Durga Chandi and start working while it played in the background filled with nostalgia of my childhood. I gave up eating non-vegetarian food as a form of respect and penance for the Goddess I was working on. All I did was pray for my best friend’s mother as I sat helplessly watching the family go through such immense tragedy. Every day, it seemed we were lost and finally Mashi (as I call her), came out of the ICU and the hospital with two kidneys gone from the attack by COVID-19 and subsequent life-threatening infections. Yet, she is today out of hospital and it couldn't have happened without the Goddess' blessings. She is still with us.”