My Savitri work with the Mother

01 September 1964

It was my physical birthday—1St September 1964. I went to the Mother. That day we commenced painting Book Four—The Book of Birth and Quest. The Mother did six sketches. The next day I sent to the Mother the final sketches which I had done on canvas boards. She wrote:

The sketches are all right and will make very nice pictures if you invoke the inspiration.

But to invoke the inspiration was no happy-go-lucky state. Once you are merged in the inner consciousness it is difficult to get out of it.

Sri Aurobindo has written aptly on inspiration:

Inspiration is a slender river of brightness leaping from a vast and eternal Knowledge; it exceeds reason more perfectly than reason exceeds the knowledge of the senses.

I did one of the paintings of Book Four, showing Aswapathy in his garden one morning, contemplating. He saw a strange Light. It reminded him of Savitri's great mission upon earth. It was obvious that he had forgotten all about it. When the Mother read the passage of this picture with a magnifying glass, she looked at me and said quietly:

Funny fellow, how could he forget what Savitri had come upon earth to do?

And she laughed—I joined her. Her lively sense of humour appeared every now and then.

Sri Aurobindo has written:

I am not aware that highly evolved personalities have no sense of humour or how the person can be said to be integrated when this sense is lacking. 'Looseness ' applies only to a frivolous levity without any substance behind it. There is no law that wisdom should be something rigidly solemn and without a smile.

I wrote to the Mother, asking how to dress and adorn Savitri, and what colour her hair, eyes and skin should be. I sent the Mother a few magazines of models, along with sketches. She wrote:

The sketches are quite good You can dress Savitri in one of these colourful saris; the style of them also is good.

For the hair let it be loose in these pictures. The colour must be auburn and the eyes dark golden, the fair Indian skin colour will be all right.

I am not keen on ornaments, but occasionally a flower in the hair may do.

After that when I asked what flower should be in her hair, the Mother said with a soft smile,

Jasmine

Also she wrote:

For Savitri:

No make up, no red dot on the forehead now for the moment.
We shall put it when she goes abroad.
Ivory skin will do quite well but a warm ivory, a sunny ivory.

Later, when I sent her the sketches, the Mother wrote:

The sketches are quite good. Would it be possible to make Savitri look at the landscape outside more intensely even if very little of her face is seen?

She must be wrapped in her contemplation of the vast world

Again I sent her the sketches. But I was not sure whether I could do nice paintings. She wrote:

The sketches are very good. Surely the inspiration will come and the paintings will be excellent.

She encouraged me a lot. But still sometimes I thought of giving up the work of painting because of disappointments. But the Mother never gave up. She wrote:

Be confident—the paintings will come all right.

When Savitri went in search of her mate, she was in a chariot.

I did the sketch according to what the Mother had explained to me. I sent it to her together with some other sketches. She wrote:

The sketches are all right. I have only changed the place of the Supreme Mother behind Savitri, because She must be touching the back of Savitri.

Here, I must write that the Mother herself had chosen the hair-do of Savitri when she set out.