The singer elaborates on the first couplet in slow tempo in his powerful voice, conjuring up a vision of ancient trees, their enormous trunks carved with complex patterns. Waterfalls cascade off cliffs, clouds thunder, lightning flashes from skies that darken from ink blue to blue-black. The singer rises to the high notes of the next couplet. The tempo becomes urgent. Ashesh sees a blur of images. The plea in the words becomes his plea. Looking at the canvas he feels them.

Your unconcern distresses me

My darling get up, come to me

Ashesh plucks his gaze from the canvas. When the hand stalls, the brain can sometimes give a hand. Ideas, thoughts—these too must be allowed their place in art. Ashesh sits still, thinking of the colour black. Thinkers of the visual world have had many things to say about it. Krishnarao Pandit's volcanic voice in his ears drags a few of them up from deep within his memory.

‘Black demands respect.’

‘Black leaves no place for compromise.’

‘Black does not please the eye, nor titillate the other senses.’

‘The colour black is not for sale. Black never prostitutes itself. It does not play with your feelings. It is at all times nothing more or less than an agent of the intellect.’

Ashesh takes a measure of the black triangles on the canvas. As he gazes at them, he grows calm. He knows that he will accept this challenge. He will dare to set foot on the new path that the colour opens up before him.

3

It is Saturday. The koel, in the rain tree across the road, fervently practises his five-note call. There's a hint in the air of the changing seasons. Sharada will sing Raag Basant this early spring evening. As she slips the cover off her tanpura, a doubt scratches the top of her mind. Her prevalent mood cannot be called bright, whereas Basant is pure joy. How will she sing it? She pushes the thought away as romantic nonsense. It is not written anywhere that Basant cannot be sung sombrely. There's that too in spring. The sprouting of the new comes with the decay of the old.

Sharada tunes the tanpura. Holding it up, she lays the stem close to her cheek and is soon absorbed in the resonance of the two notes that its four strings produce. Pa-sa-sa-Sa. She spends a few minutes getting into the melodic frame of Basant. She sings a succession of long-held notes that define the raag before singing the song she has chosen to elaborate it.

In the durbar of heaven

sing together all you divine denizens

sing the praises of spring