Eco Park sculpture garden gets tremendous response from visitors

Kolkata: A public sculpture garden on the history of Bengal, the first-of-its-kind at Eco Park has become a star attraction since its opening a couple of weeks ago.

This is the only of its kind in the country where visitors can roam around in the garden enjoying the history of Bengal in light and sound. In every light and sound show which one finds in other parts in India, the audience has to sit in a specified area to watch it. Be it in Red Fort or Cellular Jail in Andaman, there is a specific arena for the audience.

The idea of this sculpture garden has been conceived to portray the important landmarks of the history of Bengal ranging from Shri Chaitanya Mahapravu of medieval Bengal to Rabindranath Tagore of the 19th Century and 20th Century focusing on the appearance of a host of remarkable Bengali individuals in different walks of life and their profound, abundant and vital contribution to society and the country as a whole. The panels of sculpture starts with the history of medieval renaissance in Bengal led by Shri Chaitanya and ends with Rabindranath Tagore's ideals of education and foundation of Visva Bharati.

Twelve panels or Murals are focused on Shri Chaitanya, the middle-age renaissance of Bengal, Battle of Plassey, Raja Ramohan Roy and Renaissance of Bengal, Anandamath – Bankimchandra, the awakening of Bengal of India, Swami Vivekananada-Call of Youth and his activities, Santal Rebellion,The Indigo Movement, Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose – Azad Hind Fauz and his revolution, Shri Arobindo – Revolutionary converted to a Rishi, Lalan Fakir to Kazi Nazrul Islam - a different spirit of revolution and culture, Rabindranath Tagore - The Visva Bharati Movement and Satyajit Ray and his world of films.

In addition to the 12 panels (Murals) as above, there are 52 portraits that start with Shri Chaitanya Mahapravu and end with Begum Rokeya. This list includes a host of remarkable individuals who through their activities in different walks of life proved to be the makers of the history of Bengal, especially in the 19th Century.

A light and sound show is being held on evenings of duration about 40 minutes for each episode. They are done in English as well as Bengali. Initially, the tickets will be priced at a discounted rate of Rs 30 per head.

The design is conceived by Suvaprasanna, eminent artist while the principal architect is ParthaRanjan Das. The engineering part has been done by Housing Infrastructure Development Corporation (HIDCO). The sculptures have been created by artistes Priyanka Kar, ChaitaliChanda, SubirHati, Debabrata De, Samir Ray, Asim Pa, Deep Saha and GautamBarman.

The Sound and Light part has been directed by Beenu Pasricha while the narration is by Shri Barun Chanda and Meghna Sen (English) and Madhumantri Maitra and Satinath Mukherjee (Bengali). The light electronics have been done in consultation with Kelvin Ashey.