The most striking quality of her work is the ethereal nature of relationships in life whose physical quality may alter from time to time. But their essence as conceived by the artist is something worth persevering. This comes out most effectively in her work Dance of Love, showing a pair of cranes in their mating ritual. In this work, the two cranes hold the canvas together, almost as a suspension bridge thrown across the space with elements of orange grasping the top and bottom edge in flashes of light. It is not often that one sees such sensitive treatment of a subject almost done to death byartists and photographers.

Her Mahisasura, too, is a far cry from the traditional buffalo bull being speared by Durga. In fact, it reminds one of the Rape of Europa, but with the female figure being ravished by the bull. Clearly, where Renaissance art is tongue-in-cheek with the word `rape' signifying merely kidnapping, and where our traditional art shows only conquest and submission, Mukherji is able to give the theme a much more complex perception through the eyes of a woman. This complexity is where art scores over both religion and conventional morality.

Mukherji is at her best when she deals with emotions visualised as stances and gestures as in Frustration, a work where the stance of the figure alone communicates a world of complex emotions. Frustration is not merely the wall, the figure seems to be up against, but equally pervades the open space in front of it, of which the figure seems to be able to make nothing.

Mukherji reminds us that there are not merely two ways of seeing everything, theartist must see many more than these and be able to communicate them visually to really qualify as a painter of quality.

--Suneet Chopra