DOWN TO THE LETTER

DISPLAYED AT AN EXHIBITION IN KOLKATA, SATYAJIT RAY’S LETTERS TO A YOUNG FRIEND MAKE HIS WARMTH CONSPICUOUS

- Ruchir Joshi

Part of the tributes and events in Satyajit Ray’s centenary year, Iti, Satyajit Da: Letters to a Friend from Satyajit Ray (on display at the Kolkata Centre for Creativity until June 7) makes for an engrossing visit. Curator K.S. Radhakrishnan assumes that most visitors will be thoroughly familiar with Ray’s films and his multi-faceted output as graphic designer, writer, publisher and music composer. There are, therefore, no hagiographic panels explaining who Ray was or how he was one of the great directors of world cinema.

As we enter, we are greeted by clusters of photographs. While many are familiar with the work of Nemai Ghosh, here you can see Ray portrayed by other photographers as well. We see the director shooting on location or on the sets in Tollygunge. Some show Ray in his study, reading, writing, speaking. Yet other photos are lit by the harsh glare of flash: Ray with the good and the great of the film world— Raj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar, Uttam Kumar, Sharmila Tagore, Tapan Sinha and Mrinal Sen. Displayed also are posters that Ray designed for his films, covers for his children’s magazine Sandesh, and reproductions of some filming notebooks. All of these circle around the core of the exhibition—a set of letters Ray wrote to Nilanjana Sen (later Chakraborty) between 1972 and 1988.