Guwahati: President Droupadi Murmu on Wednesday conferred Padma awards to 106 people belonging to various fields including art, social work, public affairs, trade and industry, medicine, and science and engineering among others.
President Murmu presented the Padma Shri award to Hem Chandra Goswami in the field of art at Civil Investiture Ceremony-I at Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi.
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Hem Chandra Goswami is a stalwart sattriya artist known in the country and abroad for his thought-provoking ability, innovation and skill.
Born on 1 March, 1958, Goswami passed his HSLC Examination from a local High School and then he took the bachelor degree in Arts and Crafts from Arts and Crafts Society of Guwahati.
From his childhood, he was acquainted with the environment of satra, where mask making is an indispensable trait.
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It was the great Guru Sankaradeva, who had innovated the art of mask making from bamboo splits which are invariably used in the Vaishnavite plays and dances performed in the satras and namghars.
Goswami plays the pivotal role for the acceleration of the pristine skill from local to the national and universal context.
Masks prepared by him are at present installed and displayed at reputed institutions like Dibrugarh University, Tezpur University, Srimanta Sankaradeva Kalakshetra, Vivekananda Kendra, Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts, New Delhi, Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya, Bhopal and in the museums of America, Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Israel.
In the year 2015, the Chief Curator of the British Museum T Richard Blurton came to Majuli to discuss the mask depicted in the Vrindavani Vastra preserved in the British Museum.
He met Goswami to know about the mask depicted in that heritage textile piece of Assam, stayed there for five days, and took back with him five masks which are now preserved in the British Museum.
The masks were displayed in an exhibition entitled Krishna in the Garden of Assam which was held at the British Museum from January to August, 2016.
Goswami had delivered lectures on the heritage of split bamboo masks in different institutions of the country like Dibrugarh University, Tezpur University, Vivekananda Kendra, Indira Gandhi Cultural Centre for the Arts, New Delhi, Visva-Bharati and Santiniketan.
Goswami had established an institute on Sattriya Art and culture in Chamaguri Satra Majuli; Sukumar Kala peeth, to teach the new generation about the heritage of mask making of this remote part of India.
Goswami has been conferred with different prestigious awards for his expertise in mask making, which includes La Mezo Da Anand Award 2012, Damodara Deva National Award 2014, PhD from Gauhati University (Honoris causa), 2017, Luitporia Lifetime Achievement Award 2018, Sangeet Natak Academy Award 2019 and Achiever Award in Excellence on Art 2022.