Bhandari's artistic way

By Rupesh Acharya

Artists express their feelings in different ways and in different objects. Some choose stones, whereas some prefer canvas, paper or wherever they feel easy and in any convenient time. In the same way, Ram Krishna Bhandari prefers roots to demonstrate his feelings.

Bhandari exposes his extraordinary talent not in any roots, but in Bhimsenpati (Mug-Wort).

Forty three years old Bhandari’s works usually consist abstract symbol, which people find difficult to understand. "Whoever watch my work prefer explanation," says Bhandari.

Bhandari is the youngest son of late Kulaman Sing Bhandari, who is also a well known artist of his time. For Bhandari who lives in Kirtipur near Uma Maheshwar temple, the place is the most encouraging part of his creation. Whatever he earns from his work Bhandari supports his family member’s livelihood.

"Since childhood I have been learning the work of art from my father. And he always encouraged me and made good environment for my studies," says Bhandari, who further took the sculptural training from Prem Shakya, an artist from Patan in AD 1978.

For Bhandari, roots are not only object to express his feelings but stones, metals, woods and canvas are equally important. He is perfect to express in all these objects.

Bhandari has already exhibited his images in different parts of country and in 1991 AD he was successful to demonstrate his creation in Asian Art Exhibition in Bangladesh, the most remembering days of his life.

The multi-talent artist Bhandari never lives free. Whenever one finds him, he will either be striking the stone or wood or sometime sharpening plant’s roots, mostly reflecting different aspects of life.

In his artistic career he has made statues of great personality like martyr Gangalal Shrestha, poet Krishna Lal Adhikari, Parijat, Madan Bhandari and many of more people, who have contributed for the country.

"I have also created statues according to the peopls’s order, which are usually of god images," says Bhandari.

"I want my images to be lively, so the various experience of life like pity, love, running dancing, waiting and other moments are imitated in my creations," says Bhandari. Though his images are smaller than ordinary ones, they carry deep emotional messages.

Foreigners as well as locals are often found visiting his place to have a glance of his work displayed in front of his showroom.
"He is not only the pride of our place but of whole nation, who have been bestowed with the talent to preserve the natural beauty in art," says Bikash Manander, one of his neighbour.

Five years ago Bhandari came to reside in Kirtipur from his birth place Tinthana. He had come to that place without any property except for some of his father’s paintings. But his skill made him survive along wtih other family member.

As a teacher he used to teach art in Nandi High School and has also taught other students as well foreigners who are interested to learn about art. Anthony Pawell, an Austrian tourist learned sculpture within five days from him, who is now working as an artist in his own country.

"These days I have difficulty in getting proper stone," says he. "To make a Chi Bha (small Buddha stupa) I have to search for a month or more."

For a stupa he needs a stone of about six feet high and four feet round. According to him, for stone he roams around a village Machegaun, which is around three kilometer from Kathmandu Valley.

"There is a need of seperate Academy for fine Arts, which will help to promote artists," says Bhandari. "Then the artist will be in better position and the new generation will get a chance to promote and preserve the fine art."

A complete picture of Kathmandu

Razen Manandhar

God knows how many people have sold dreams of developing the country’s capital in last several decades to the people living in the capital. This poor old city have been a lucrative means for thousands of development pundits, foreign scholars and fresh students to explore their expertise and beg foreign donations, or even consume the national budget in the name of urban development projects. But alas, none of them had ever tried to find out what their target, the golden egg-laying chicken for money, looks like.

Finally, Kathmandu Valley Mapping Programme (KVMP), the joint effort of Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) and European Commission, has done this job for all. A complete book that gives microscopic detail of the city, where almost one million people dwell and almost the similar additional number of people come and go everyday, is just published. The entire 35 ward chairmen, 140 ward members, and the technical team of KVMP not excluding the efforts, suggestions and complains of the local residents are .

The book divides the metropolis into five major sectors: Central, Eastern, Northern, Core City and Western. The smallest and the densest among the five, Core City, is further subdivided into two, namely Core North and Core South. The old division of 35 wards remains the same. The book presents statistical details of each of the ward to the maximum on the base of the community meetings in which the local people identified the problem of the area and suggested possible solutions to them. This contains the population and household numbers of the ward. This gives the base for all the future development projects. Till now all the projects are going on with the least information about the house hold numbers. The local government has been spending money on local development projects without knowing how many of the people will be the actual beneficiary. The size of the wards are unequal but where the core area are smaller in size with dense population, the outer wards have relatively less density though they are big in size.

Then it provides information about the number and types of the house, length and types of roads, access to drainage, system of managing solid waste, percentage of households enjoying infrastructures like electricity, water, telephone and toilets.

It contains details of the number of schools with their specifications — how many are primary, lower secondary, and higher secondary, health institutions with their services and number of visiting patients, administrative offices and areas they occupy, financial institutions, industries, shops and their types, service institutions, training institutes, entertainment spots and security stations.There is a description of how many parking spaces are there and how big each of them are , with the types of vehicles that could be parked in that area. Then it names the monument zones and the area they occupy. Similarly it also lists other landmark buildings.

It provides a calendar of the festivals that takes place in the ward. Without giving the details of each festival, the book highlights the significance of the ward as the home of so and so local cultural heritage. It And there is also a list of historical or other public places like water spouts, public taps, wells, rest houses, temples, stupas, bahals, ponds, and rivers. It also identifies the area where people have squatted upon illegally, giving the area and number of such houses.

It prioritises five major problems of the ward. For example, the ward No 1 has identified drainage, roads, monument conservation, environment improvement and parking as the major problems. The ward offices then presents a brief sketch of the recently completed, running and proposed development projects.

The photographic illustrations of the wards are additional beauty. Photographs of new landmark buildings as well as ancient monuments have been equally used, providing a complete picture of the contemporary metropolis that tight-rope walking between the poles of orthodox society with traditional values and ultra modern definition of urban lifestyle.However, though the book is a result of a grand planning, it provides 10 years old demographic data. Central bureau of Statistic has not provided the result of the 2001 census to it used that of the census 2001.

MAIN