A tribute to Parvez

 Speaking about baroda archive as a treasury or graveyard

So you are not here any more....

We did not speak for about a year before you went. It does feel that we were giving each other space. You wanting to see me settling down and finding a deeper direction, extremely uncomfortable with the multiple directions that my work was talking...I too wanted you to settle in more.  For me you are the best art historian of our generation, but i did not like you giving up chess, poetry, drawing and so much more. 

you could have been doing your Phd from the most elite university possible, but you chose to do it from Kala Bhavan and teach there; it made me proud. The history department really needs your energy and excellence...perhaps more than that your commitment to pedagogy.  

Living in Shantinketan, cycling to work rushing to complete your Phd, making books for Nandanmela...what a beautiful life you had. Why did you loose connection with your self.  Why did it take you so much time to realize how ill you were, why none of us knew?

You were possibly the only one who combined the field research and rigor of old art history with the criticality of the New...you were the only one with the commitment to be equally deep in both and yet balance it.  

Art history is a dying discipline they say...like a loosing team on the dying moments of a football match, you knew that we can never win it now, but still fighting hard for a draw...it is as if you were running with the ball all alone aiming to shoot...and then you tripped and fell...hurt yourself so hard that you had to leave the field. What is our tribute to you will show in how we plan the match now on.