Kala Paridrishya
Paradigm Shift in Indian Modernism
Rabindranath Tagore and Amrita Sher-Gil
Johny ML
'Paradigm Shift in Indian Modernism: Rabindranath Tagore and
Amrita Sher-Gil' was the topic of Ashok Bhowmick's illustrated lecture at the
IIC, Delhi on 14th May. Organized by Dhoomimal Gallery, this lecture
kick-started the collateral programs of the forthcoming Retrospective of Ashok
Bhowmick at the Bikaner House in November 2025.
Veteran artist, art critic and art history researcher, Ashok Bhowmick has been interested in the above subject for quite a long time. His primary contention is that there has been a fundamental fallacy in our analysis of the Indian modern art; we 'read' a modern work of art rather than 'see' one, because of this often we tend to create stories 'about' a work of art instead of 'seeing' it, taking its formal values into consideration. Formal values, held high by a practicing artist, are often overlooked because of the patrons' 'need' for a convincing story.
Bhowmick finds a historical and socio-cultural reason for such a fallacious approach to art in India. In India, art has always been an 'illustration' of the familiar narratives. What art did to a larger section of the society which was forced to be illiterate and deprived of 'knowledge' and 'texts' due to the enforcement of caste hierarchies, was subjecting them to the narratives ingrained in the oral traditions. Hence, a work of art had the mission to 'illustrate' and 'educate' the masses. This missionary high-handedness of patrons of yore had made Indian art a field of 'illustrations'.
Illustrations are not stand alone art works. A narrative is a precondition for an illustration. Identification and empathy with a work of art were expected from the viewers based on this precondition of 'recognition' (of the story). Citing a series of examples Bhowmick established how, even during the Bengal Revivalist period, the illustrative aspect gave the fundamental framework for understanding art.
According to Bhowmick, the first significant rupture from
this 'illustrative continuity' happened with the arrival of Rabindranath Tagore
as a visual artist. Though Tagore's art did not happen in a vacuum, he was the
first one to separate his literature from his art. He wrote poems, novels,
short stories and plays but he never illustrated them. Self-referencing visual
texts happened in Tagore too but they functioned within a renewed context
completely detached from the puranic and mythological narratives.
Amrita Sher-Gil took it to the next level, according to Bhowmick by including the excluded. Though post-modernist subaltern narratives and micro-narratives where theoretically substantiated in those days Sher-Gil turned her attention to the 'people' of India and never attributed them any mythological qualities or dimensions. Besides, Bhowmick explained how the formal values of both Tagore and Sher-Gil had great distinctions as they employed softness and thickness of colors or pure avoidance of it depending on the mood and subject, which became their established styles, almost inimitable.
Bhowmick takes a departure from what Geeta Kapur had established in her book When was Modernism, where she found modernism in Indian art as a conjoined narrative of nationalism. Bhowmick keeps the trajectory of Indian nationalist art as an extension of the 'illustration' of the existing narratives, which was, though he did not say it in many words, 'Hindu' art or a kind of art that fell back on the resources of the newly found alternative secular streams as envisioned by the artists who came around Tagore in Santiniketan. As per Bhowmick, Tagore and Sher-Gil were the flag-bearers of Indian modernism in art, and his lecture was convincing to see that departure in perspective.
“The only true reality lies in the interaction between the physical and the psychological. I aim to capture this movement in my work.” — Rm. Palaniappan
Nature Morte is proud to present an exhibition of new works by Rm. Palaniappan. Born in 1957, Palaniappan lives and works in Chennai. His career spans more than four decades and includes a wide variety of works in all mediums, most specifically prints and works on paper. His newest works are paintings using acrylic on canvas in a variety of sizes. Each painting contains the image of tangled lines, lines that meander in multiple directions, twisting and turning in on themselves. The lines change colors as they progress, adding both substance and personality, suggesting the journey of life. The works resemble cartographies of military maneuvers as seen from above, landscapes based on a new type of geographic perspective. As the artist has said : “Only someone flying in space can make a three-dimensional drawing and stretch it to infinity, thus expressing complete human freedom.” As described by the writer Sadanand Menon: “A neutral, non-anthropomorphic space, a kind of experimental geography and the possibility of proposing radical landscapes. Images of unnamable places and their visual representations, whether terrestrial or planetary or astronomical.”
As studies of movement in space, the paintings could be said to ad dress the latest developments in physics, namely theories of Quantum Entanglement. Palaniappan’s family was involved with the commercial and graphic arts, his father being a distributor of calendar art and later his brothers owned printing and packaging companies. Palaniappan’s artistic practice from the late 1970s (when he was in art college) to the early 2000s was entirely dedicated to printmaking, collages, and graphic works on paper. This history is retained in the paintings today, as the borders of each are demarcated with contrasting colors, numbers hover in the margins, and the target devices used for registration are still present. The addition of sand to the paint creates a subtle texture in the paintings, further emphasizing their references to landscapes and cartography. In all, the artist’s interests in science, math and outer space (present since childhood and operative in his entire practice) are distilled into crystalized representations.
Rm. Palaniappan was born in Devakottai, Tamil Nadu in 1957 and has been based in Chennai since the late 1970s. He is an alumnus of the Government College of Arts and Crafts in Chennai, where he acquired a Diploma in Fine Arts, Painting in 1980 and a PG Diploma in Industrial Design, Ceramics in 1981. He studied advanced lithography at the Tamarind Institute in Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA in 1991 and was an Artist in Residence at Oxford University, UK in 1996. He is a recipient of the Fulbright Grant, the Charles Wallace (India) Trust, International Visitorship program of USIS, and Senior Fellowship of the Government of India. His works have been included in group exhibitions all over the world and in India he has held solo shows of his works with the galleries Art Heritage and Nature Morte in New Delhi, Sakshi Gallery in Mumbai, Apparao Galleries in Chennai, and Gallery Sumukha in Bangalore. Palaniappan’s works are included in the permanent collections of the National Gallery of Modern Art and Lalit Kala Akademi in New Delhi, the British Museum and the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, Oxford University in Oxford, Cincinnati Art Museum in the US, the Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of Art in Kansas, US, the Library of Congress in Washington DC, the Taipei Art Museum in Taiwan, the Madras Art Museum in Chennai, and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, among others. A comprehensive retrospective of his works since 1976, entitled “Mapping the Invisible,” was hosted by Dakshinachitra Museum in Chennai from December 15, 2024 to April 4, 2025.
Uma Nair
At Bikaner House in Delhi, you have to walk up to the first floor of the Centre for Contemporary Art and savour a panoramic work of Phaneendra Nath Chaturvedi’s butterflies in a small room to know the power and passion of this brilliant artist who trained at College of Art Lucknow. Looking at his work with his professor Jai Krishna Agarwal on Saturday became a moment of deep revelations and reflections between Guru and shishya.
the butterflies flutter over the surface of the canvas, it reminds me of the world’s finest artist Yayoi Kusama’s mosaic-like shards in their spread wings, each revealing exquisite patterns of orange, red, white and blue spots. For Phaneendra, the butterfly is more than a symbol of fragility and beauty; it is a symbol of service, of selfless spiritual significance, and a metaphor for man and nature.
Nestled and sprinkled on pedestals in this room are his butterfly sculptures shining in modern steel and sculpted in the realms of technological finesse. The details and precision of the creatures’ wings in many ways fuse with Phaneendra’s own mesmeric style. Comprising an iridescent assortment of colours and hues, the sculptures bear a similarly diaphanous and lustred quality that enchants us. We gaze at the painting and the sculptures too and think of intricately tessellated backgrounds—a flattened plane of biomorphic swarms —sprawling and propagating into infinite spacelike cells under a microscope.
Repetition is Phaneendra’s elixir; he creates his own corollary with an ‘all-over’ method, the shapes evoking the enduring legacy of an infinite carnival of butterflies celebrating the ecological spectrum.
Then in the largest room on the top floor is the man with flat wings, reminding us of an aeroplane. Whatever he paints or draws or creates with pencil and pastel, each work comes alive with unique perceptual effects. In his archetypal grim grim-looking, intimate figurative imagery, each work presents the artist Phaneendra’s spectacular, pulsating vision.
Phaneendra’s fascination with the winged man is inextricable from his experience and appreciation of the world.” On earth, man is only one dot among millions of others,” he says. ” We must not forget ourselves with the desires of our burning ambition. I feel that in our everyday struggles; we lose ourselves in the ever-advancing stream of eternity.”
Take the lift and look at his winged man sculpture on the ground floor. Here he calls it Totem and you see a fiberglass sculpture of a man with an owl’s wings. Precision and perfection tell us that this modern man in a pair of impeccable trousers is a testimony to time. The artist’s pleasure in nature and its abundant variety of forms is palpable. Each individual wing, whether in a drawing on the two walls or in a single sculpture, is painstakingly rendered in both graphite as well as fiberglass. The open wings unfurl into swathes of space, exuberant in expanse.
The series he has created as clusters over the last few years are delicately articulated. We must note that the artist’s work became smoother, more orderly, figurative, and above all, more pensive. There is indeed a lightness as well as a gravitas to these subsequent paintings.
At the centre of the long corridor stands a monochromatic suited man created in mixed media on archival paper from the year 2016 titled The Good Wisher. Unpretentious and filled with a host of hidden emotions, the bouquet of flowers and caparisoned little bird on the shoulder become organic objects likely to speak to Phaneendra’s own experiences as well as memories of formative fascination for both botanical as well as zoological species.
At once, you think of the masterpiece of the Monarch Butterfly with a portrait of a suited man created in pencil and pastel, and realise that the butterfly possesses spiritual significance in Southeast Asian cultures. At once a symbol of metamorphosis and transformation, it is believed by many to transport the soul between terrestrial and celestial realms after death. Its associated mythologies pertain to Phaneendra’s own practice, his deep and enduring meditations on the self, the cosmos and eternity. His sensitivity to the fragile creature with a short life is indeed both personal as well as deeply contemplative. As soon as you savour the studies and his inbuilt and inherent sense of perfection, you realise that these brightly coloured insects further encapsulate childhood comfort and nostalgia in the beauty of his own teenage daughter.
Combining meticulous, figurative elements with the hypnotic traces of his own love for realism, this solo exhibition curated by Sanya Malik is a powerful example of Phaneendra’s visual idioms and his spellbound observations of the natural and man-made world around him.
Courtesy : TOI Blog
Hem Raj & His Art-scape
Sushma K Bahl
An amazing expanse of over a dozen mammoth paintings, immersed in dense and colourful suite of imagery appears in Hem Raj’s solo exhibition titled Eternal Reminiscence. Entailing a duality of absence and presence, the collection adorns an enigmatic look and feel. Within the framework of contemporary abstraction, a wide spectrum of non-discernible non-figurative formless forms, somewhat surrealist, appear in the artist’s free flowing creatives. There are enchanting compositions which incorporate ideas and symbols, line work, variously painted shapes and shades, dots and metaphors, calligraphy and collage. Painted in bold and fluid streaks and contours, the art works resonate with a spontaneity. Interwoven with intuition and mystique, they seem to emerge out of a metamorphic realm. Unconventional and ephemeral, the ‘non-object’ non-recognizable imagery relates to no particular form or figure, narrative or “pre-thought-out ideas or context” asserts the artist who has evolved his own distinct abstract lexicon.
Tracing Track
The place and pride that Hem Raj’s art enjoys today, has come to him through a winding track. The trajectory he has had to follow, meandered through various routes and realms before he could pursue his inborn talent in art. Neither his parents nor anyone else in the family that he grew up amidst, had any interest or affiliation with art. Hem Raj himself, passionate about creativity, had no interest in academics. He spent most of his time in class drawing and painting, and did poorly in studies at school. The father naturally got worried about his son’s future and arranged for the young boy to apprentice with a tailor. But that ended abruptly as the restless Hem Raj did not find it worthwhile. The next came his training as an electrician, which too did not last long as it could not sustain his interest. A self-inspired person passionate about art, he decided to take things in his own hands and convinced his father, that art was his calling. Helped by his art teacher at school, who was the first one to spot his talent, the young boy managed to get admission for a bachelor’s degree in painting at the College of Art in Delhi.
A similar rendezvous has been a part of his subsequent art track. Beginning with still life, it has traversed through figuration, portraiture and narrative genres. Also experimented with landscape and learnt Thangka painting. Attended workshops and art camps to network and enhance his skills. Turned finally to abstraction, in which he has created a niche for himself. The style that continues to be his destined calling, can only be categorised as an abstract oeuvre. It is this domain that brought Hem Raj his first invitation for a solo show while he was still in the final year for a master’s degree at the art college. “The exhibition received good critical feedback and people became aware of my art, but nothing got sold”, said the artist with a mixed sense of joy and dismay. Fortunately things changed fairly quickly and positively for him. Hem Raj recalls with pride the next exhibition, when three of his paintings in a group show were the first ones to get picked up by a collector. Since this first success, he and his art, has never had to look back, winning both positive appraisal and monetary gains for him and his work.
Art Aesthetics
Marked for his distinct style, art is like a soul search, an intuitive experience for Hem Raj. The emphasis in his incredible body of work is on sensuousness, mystery and lyricism. Improvising and painting, it is the force of his creative unconsciousness that brings the ideas alive as he takes up his brush, dips it in oil paint and begins working on a canvas. Devoid of conventionality he does not compose laboured or pre-planned pictures. Instead plays in free abundance with discrete elements to create some unexpected unstructured but effective surrealist abstract visuals. Unveiling the un-manifest, his formless forms bring forth the unknown. The aesthetics of his work engages with undefinable mysterious erotic forms, that engross not only the retina, but also the mind soul and emotions of the viewer.
Another interesting feature of Hem Raj’s art and aesthetics is the incorporation of decorative elements in the milieu of his unequivocally Indian, spontaneous and timeless work. His creatives can be traced to the country’s ancient roots in tantric, tribal and craft traditions. Embracing concepts around cycle of life, planetary movements, changing seasons, fertility and divine metaphors such as lingam, Bindu (symbolising Shiva’s third eye) and totem pole. His masterly pieces in abstract and geometric renditions invoke a spiritual aura. His forms are expressive but not realistic. Equally inspired by modern masters of Indian art such as VS Gaitonde, SH Raza, Ram Kumar and their contemporaries, he has also studied the work of Western abstract expressionists like Jackson Pollock, Paul Klee, Joan Miro and others. However much of his art style is distinctly his own, which he has evolved over time, “guided by my teachers Jai Zharotia and Rajesh Mehra”.
He enjoys painting in oil on canvas, does not like acrylic as “acrylic paint gets lighter with time and loses its sheen” opines the artist. Water colours are used sparingly and only for smaller works. He opts for larger, more often enormous sized canvases. On his preference is for oil paints and larger canvases he asserts “they allow me more space for a free play”. The palette like the rest of his imagery is spontaneous and colourful. Though red is his favourite colour, he uses a variety of colours, picking them up randomly, or what lies in front of him at a given moment.
Quick with his work, Hem Raj can do a lot in eight or so hours that he spends on his own art practice every day. Working on several canvases simultaneously, he keeps his focus on the one painting in hand for each day. Beginning with preparing the base by covering the blank canvas with a coat of one colour, whichever is readily available, Hem Raj begins to play on the canvas. There is no preplanning or thought-out grammar involved in the work. No sketching either, prior to painting the canvas directly with a brush. “It is done entirely spontaneously”, claims the artist, as he allows the brush to take the paint on its course, any which way that it goes. With paint flowing in different directions, indiscernible imagery begins to take shape on the canvas. “If what appears on the surface does not appeal to me, I delete it, by removing the paint with my spatula”. Even this process of addition and deletion in the painting happens on its own, guided by the divine. “At times, the finished work surprises me too”.
Abstract organic lines, reminiscent perhaps of his early life encounters with tailoring or may be electrical work, appear here and there in his work recurrently. Various other symbols and geometric renderings make their way too on the canvases anew and fresh in each composition. He likes to finish painting the work in hand the same day “as it helps maintain a rhythm”. Engaging with tonality, the coloured stretches on his canvas come thick and fast and in an interface of tranquillity with aggression. Starting with a thin layer of paint, he moves on to painting in thicker layers. “I paint 15 to 20 layers of oil paint wet on wet, covering the whole surface and in quick succession, without allowing time for each layer to dry before putting the next one on top”. The artist explains that multiple laying in such a rapid progression, helps ensure that the subsequent layers do not weave into the lower ones, besides protecting oil paint from developing cracks. It also adds the right tonality and texture, to the structure and framework in his art scape.
Eternal Reminiscence
Hem Raj’s eternal reminiscence series in this second edition is expansive and rooted. The compositions mirror the artist’s spiritual bent of mind where the physical world perceived as an illusion appears to merge with all pervasive divine spirit and the surrounding natural phenomena. With its focus on meditation and inner contemplation, the artist taps into a realm of abstraction. Somewhat surrealist and beyond worldly realities, the featured paintings, encompass a wide range of styles. Beyond the confines of defined forms, Hem Raj’s eternal reminiscence artworks are filled in with different shapes, signs, markings and lines - straight or twisted or zig-zag, with calligraphic notations. There is text calligraphed with names of divinities in some paintings and symbols suggestive of temple bells and rain drops in the others. There are also suggestive motifs of birds in flight or plants swaying in the air. Metamorphic and imagined impressions of tantras, mandalas, creepers, and animals are incorporated in a primordial language of his own design. Painted in a wide spectrum of unrestrained colours, the palette in the series ranges from bright red, blue, green and yellow to some subtle markings painted in black and pastel shades. This approach endows the depicted paintings with an other-worldly spark and a soul. Also makes them more engaging and accessible.
Four Iconic Artists
(Shridharani Art Gallery, New Delhi, 29 October - 10 November 2024)
Yashodhara
Dalmia
Curator
As notions of feudalism began to dissipate, and an awareness of historical identity and the concept of a nation became part of the new quest for freedom in India, it became evident that modernism in art would manifest itself as a major vehicle for self-expression. Instead of the largely mimetic and picturesque works that had been popular and had immobilised art, the emerging forms began to be transformed into a vital and imaginative genre.
It was this encrusted modernity with its multiple levels of aesthetic codes, reflecting the diversity of the country, which became established and a forceful consciousness arose of a growing individualism and a powerful need for self-expression. In Bombay as well as in other cities, as groups of artists congregated to articulate their innovative beliefs, a strong and multiple form of modernism began to take place. In a rising nation it was the underbelly of existence that inevitably became the prime focus for the artists as the burgeoning life of the streets spilled out and created a vivid entourage of memory and metaphor.
While Euro-American modernity placed countries like India as the ‘other ‘and the ‘marginal’ they were at the same time dependent on the colonised, a result of interpenetration with the material and aesthetic notions of these countries. Displacing the notion of this modernity as pivotal then, we have to see that there was a fusion and the creation of a ‘Third Space’ where as the scholar Homi Bhabha emphasized the ‘difference is neither the One nor the Other, but something else besides, in-between’.1 Hence the multi-dimensional cultural forms which created the paradigms for non-eurocentric modernities and also emerged in India privileged this norm as significant and gained widespread popularity.
In Bombay, a group of artists gathered in 1947 to form the Progressive Artists’ Group in the very year that India gained Independence, and in their compelling endeavour for rooting modernism in their country presaged the very core of art in the nation. The group was initiated by the artist Francis Newton Souza [1924-2002] who with his audacious distortions of the human form and frank exposures of the body not only aroused a strong reaction but also created the tenor for modern art. The other artists in the Group consisted of M.F. Husain, S.H. Raza, K.H. Ara, S.K. Bakre and H.A. Gade and their primary objective was to propel a modernism which critiqued the outmoded practices of schools of art and rejected outright the revivalistic approach of the Bengal School.
With a new nation coming into being and with the onset of modern Indian art, it was Francis Newton Souza who could be said to be the generative source of this creative transformation. The Goan artist had not only founded the Progressive Artists Group in 1947 but created the syntax for Indian art with his devilish heads, nude and voluptuous women and apocalyptic landscapes which began to expose the seamier side of existence. These were images which were deftly made with few bold strokes and etched out the human physiognomy in all its disingenuity such as the work in this collection (oil on board,1957). In engaging with these, the artist was to make eminently modern forms which depicted contemporary life. Souza’s strict Catholic upbringing in Portugese Goa had far from making him a devout Christian, instead provoked him into being ferociously anarchic against the rigidities and the corrupt practises of the Church. His view of Christ was not that of a compassionate figure but of the vengeful God of Romanesque Churches in Spain.
Souza left for London in 1949 where he experienced the country’s post war angst and witnessed ravaged buildings and food shortages which cast their gloomy shadows. He found it difficult to exhibit his works and lived in a situation of penury. A few years of deprivation followed but after that the artist’s inherent talent began to be recognized. In 1954, he participated in the group show held at the Institute of Contemporary Arts where he exhibited along with artists like Graham Sutherland and Francis Bacon with whom his work can be said to have a correspondence. In infusing the dark mood of the post- war era Francis Bacon (1909-1992) for instance had exposed the human form with the hideous and the brutal underside of his personality. A meeting with the poet, critic and editor of Encounter, Stephen Spender also brought about his participation in an exhibition and would also lead to the publication of his autobiographical essay ‘Nirvana of a Maggot’ in Encounter the following year which won him further acclaim. This coincided with his solo exhibition in 1955 at Gallery One. Writing on this exhibition the famed critic John Berger wrote,’ How much his pictures derive from Western art and how much from the hieratic temple traditions of his country, l cannot say. Analysis breaks down and intuition takes over. It is obvious that he is a superb designer and an excellent draughtsman. I find it quite impossible to assess his work comparatively. Because he straddles several traditions but serves none’2 Souza’s manifestation of hypocrisy acquired depth and dimension, however, when he impasted on his papal exposition an adult revulsion of power and corruption. His manifestations of the grotesque resulted in heads which were to bare the canker within the soul as it were. The cold, soulless eyes for forehead, gnashing teeth for mouth and the face bounded by ferocious lines in a ridged, rocky terrain petrified by its own violence became his means of exposing the inner malevolence of the soul. In a work such as in this collection (oil on board, 1961), the denouement of the upper classes with their vestments of polite behaviour and their underlying corruption impacts the viewer. In time to come the foetus heads, as Souza would have them, became tubular, then dotted with wriggles and squibbles and finally composed of octagonal shapes connected with funnels. Many examples of these can be seen as part of this exhibition. Even as the heads became increasingly inventive in their devilish visage, they also began to lose some of the earlier energy and passion and veer towards design, though ingeniously composed. Yet in their heyday they were to arouse the sheer horror of man’s inhumanity to man.
Apocalyptic Landscapes
The landscapes made by Souza are diametrically different from the picturesque and calm vistas of conventional modes. The ingenuous rectilinear shapes which were made in splashes of vivid colour created an exploding vision of the holocaust and nuclear outbursts where instability became the defining mode. The houses seem to be bursting by seismic undercurrents which would tear things asunder erupting from within. In one of the works here (oil on canvas ,1964) the brilliant red structures are on the verge of falling into an abyss of nothingness as the firm outlines of houses slide downwards shaking the very foundation of polite society.
Souza’s Still Lifes such as Untitled, (oil on canvas, 1959) seem to move towards angles and positions which would draw from his experience of wider world and would frame his objects. These are far removed from the intimate comforts of home and glazed with the reflections of his diverse experiences. In his diverse experiments with gouache, pen and ink, mixed media, oil on canvas and board and chemical paintings Souza’s brilliant draughtmanship creates a world of burning embers and sizzling disasters which have a profound effect of disarming conventions.
The violence as well as tenderness which infuse his most rebellious works create elegiac renderings of the magnificent. It could be said that these forms not only questioned oppressive methods but also in their wiry lines and astringent compositions turned conventional notions of art upside down.
Subramanyan’s Subversions
Across the continent on the eastern side, at Santiniketan, the multiple oeuvres of the artist, K.G. Subramanyan (1924-2016) consisted of polymorphic works made in diverse media ranging from paintings, water colours and reverse painting on glass to murals, sculpting and even set designing. Of these we can take note of a splendid suite of glass paintings which took place in the eighties reusing the technique of the practice from colonial times, but subverting its content to sardonic, witty and humorous narratives of the present. Quite ingeniously the artist imbued these works with an erotic flavour, reflecting the Kalighat traditions and relaying it for the present.
Subramanyan’s imbibing of the Santiniketan methods where he trained and taught was ingrained in his teaching at the MS University, Vadodara influencing whole generations of students. Following this he moved back to Santiniketan where he lived and worked till his retirement when he settled down in Vadodara.
Polymorphic Portraits
The extension of boundaries in form and method lay at the core of Subramanyan’s works. In the artist’s polymorphic works the animated movement of the portraits creates the notion of time within the moment. In the present series this imbues the visage with a sense of mobility while remaining still. In doing so the ordinary person extends his boundaries beyond the finite to the notion of being extraordinary. Thus, in the work Ragini Vibhas (Reverse painting on glass, 2003) in the present series the forms are juxtaposed both horizontally and vertically laying the surface open to further narratives. The man and woman in Leela (Acrylic on canvas, 2011) seem to incite dialogues between themselves as well as create a gestalt of the back and front as plants, animals and birds foreground the planar dimensions of the painting.
As the artist Nilima Sheikh pointed out, ‘Subramanyan brings to service the notion of modular divisions, additive in nature. The attenuation of form is conditioned directly by format, by the exigencies of space in this modular construct. Contour has a forming function which parallels rather than completes the function of colour formulation. This dual forming is extended through a calligraphic flourish that activates negative spaces. And the structural grid of the modular divisions repeats itself in patterns, enlivening the surface. Conversely, localized surface patterning may extend itself to form the overall design. Subramanyan employed these devices not only to reduce the art-craft polarities he found detrimental to an understanding of either, but also to engage in the practice of art as a craftsman might.’ 5
It was at the Fine Art Fair held in Vadodara in 1972 that Subramanyan first designed toys which became a further extension of his language. Made of bamboo, leather and beads these puppet- like animal forms served to bridge the gap between art and craft as well as create new compositions. As Sheikh pointed out, ‘For Subramanyan the fair was the best occasion to vindicate his several obsessions: the mobility between art and craft practice, between studio exercise and working in situ, between painting and the physically more projective arts, between varying scales and different materials and finally, between art as serious business ---and as fun.’6
According to the
artist ‘I have always used a fluid kind of space but this is not necessarily
true only of the miniatures. It is characteristic of a lot of oriental
paintings. But I will not quarrel with miniature because after all what is a
miniature? It is a painting to be read. Generally speaking, what you call an
easel painting is an extension of the miniature. Later people got into a
conflict about whether a painting was to be read or whether it was there for
decorative purposes. An abstract image takes away the readability or keeps it
subservient. In any case when I paint, I try to keep these two things
together—the human drama and the generality of the image. I like to use various
devices like the polyptch where various incidents, complete in themselves are
grouped together.7
Ram Kumar’s Sombre
Forms
Ram Kumar’s (2024—2018) lonely, alienated individuals located within tattered houses and shabby streets created the awareness of the plight of the ordinary person in a newly emerged, developing but also traumatised nation. These forlorn figures with their gaunt faces and melancholy eyes such as the girl sitting with a pensive expression and her hands clenched in this collection, loomed large over the cityscape and provoked a deep empathy.
He was an accidental artist and yet reached great heights in his works. Ram Kumar’s early days were as a banker and later as a journalist with the newspaper Hindustan Times. In the meantime, he had joined Sarada Ukil’s evening art classes. He also wrote stories in Hindi about lower middle-class individuals and the sordidness of their lives which was faced by them with great fortitude. This provided him with a means of existence but his increasing involvement with art took him to Paris where he studied under Andre Lhote and Fernand Leger.
Ram Kumar’s stay in Paris was not an easy one but as he struggled to survive, he also learnt to sharpen his tools. ‘I told my father I wanted to go to Paris and study art there. He bought a ship ticket which was Rs.700 and then I reached Paris without any money.
The Paris years were known for the camaraderie Ram Kumar shared with artists like S.H. Raza and Akbar Padamsee. His training in Paris along with his association with the Mumbai based Progressive Artists Group and with the Delhi Shilpi Chakra, provided the necessary professional alignments which enabled him to sharpen his artistic tools.
Ram Kumar’s paintings of Varanasi are well known for their lucid interpretation of the pilgrimage centre. It was in 1960 that he visited Varanasi with the painter M.F. Husain to study the sacred city at close quarters and this would prove to be a watershed in his painterly oeuvre. The stay there resulted in a series of paintings where, while the bustle and energy of the city and its sharp contrast with life and death were predominant in Husain’s works, Ram Kumar’s tight cubes of human dwellings were packed together precariously as shown in this collection and seemed as if they might crumble even as death dissolves life. Although there is no human presence, Kumar’s Varanasi works are haunting evocations of human suffering as well as fortitude in their continued endurance against great odds. As he stated, ‘The place, the light in the place plays an important role. The gullies, after gullies, the widows, the old men waiting to die. Manikarnika ghat and the dead bodies. There is hardly any difference between the dead and the alive there. They are waiting to be cremated.’9
According to the artist, ‘I think personally when you come to analyse yourself then you think when you are making formative paintings. I think psychologically you are undergoing certain phases of your own problems and they conveyed something in your paintings, in your colours and forms and gradually when the changes take place within yourself too then I think the colours and forms become different. In earlier times they were very muted, black and white and greys but now they are lighter so now perhaps one is more free. One wants to have more freedom so one applies many colours and see how what sort of feeling they create. One is not committed by any colour.10
In his later years Ram Kumar’s brooding works see the emergence of wedges of reds and greens as he attains an even greater freedom with his colours. A twig, a bit of broken roof tile, would give a glimmer of the storm underlying the radiating surface. The sense of pain beneath the most sensuous of his strokes creates an ever-present concern with human existence.
Gaitonde’s Luminous
Depths
While being exposed to the works of Western modernists along with that of the Indian miniature tradition V.S. Gaitonde (1924-2001) developed a penetrating insight into form and colour which provided him with new painterly modes. These varied influences combined to develop his non representational vocabulary in the late 50s when he abandoned his figurative style. The earliest work however such as in this collection (Oil on paper, 1950s) were figurative, similar to Ram Kumar, albeit a lyrical description of the countryside and idyllic renderings of village belles.
The metier and substance of his works later was the painterly surface itself where the application of paint created a highly textured area with thick and thin paint balancing themselves to reflect light in a nuanced manner. In New York on a Rockefeller scholarship in 1964 his work further transformed when coming into contact with the Abstract Expressionist form of painting with its focus on all- over paint which was dripped or slashed on the canvas.
The school itself had become a marker for High Modernism and set about a ripple of possibilities in the painterly world. Indeed, he along with the artist Krishen Khanna had visited Mark Rothko’s studio and this proved to be a catalyst for his own emergence of tints over large expanses.
Gaitonde’s luminous colours would assume no shape and form and would evoke nothing other than themselves. It was the very surface which was the sensuous pre-occupation of the artist, and he modulated paint on it as if it were his object of passion. The artist’s colour surfaces are translucent, creating almost an underwater ambience with beams of light penetrating the depths. His radiant reds with flashes of light such as the one in this collection (Oil on canvas 1991) would create a conglomeration of colour and strokes which seemed to rise from unknown depths. His swabs of paint would regurgitate from the very bottom like the limitless ocean which he had sat across and ruminated for hours from his studio at Bhulabhai Desai Road in Mumbai. The white stroke on white for instance could create the textured tonality which provoked the profound essence of creation. At the centre of his paintings lay the belief in bringing this to the fore with its boundless possibilities.
The artist himself contradicted the fact that he was an abstract painter and always referred to his own paintings as being ‘non-objective’. In his later works and after a serious accident in the mid-80s his work developed a painterly hieroglyphic and calligraphic system of signs and symbols which intuitively recalled the hallowed grace of the universe. An artist prone to meditative silence he tended to dwell on both Zen philosophy and ancient beliefs including calligraphy.
The artists who came to the fore and continued with their creations were to influence ensuing generations over the century. Their styles, and also importantly their beliefs, formed the path that was later taken and evolved by modern and contemporary art in India. From Souza’s diabolical humans which questioned corruption, to Subramanyan’s expressive delineation of street life, Ram Kumar’s tightly-wedged houses which muffled the surface in despair and Gaitonde’s emblazoned paintings rising from the depths we have the emergence of a monumental art for the country. The language thus created became varied and distinctive in shapes and colours as an underlying unity of beliefs knitted it together for the people as a whole. In the struggle to carve a meaningful path which reflected contemporary life, the artists’ heroic attempts became symbolic of the nation’s own impassioned means of existence.
NOTES
1. Homi K. Bhabha,
The Location of Culture London and New York,1998
2. John Berger, New
Statesman, date unknown
3. F.N. Souza,
‘Cultural Imperialism,’ Patriot Magazine, February 12,1984
4. K.G. Subramanyan, Santiniketan, the Making of a Contextual Modernism catalogue of the show at NGMA curated by R.Siva Kumar, NGMA, New Delhi, 1997
5. Nilima Sheikh A Post-Independence Initiative in Art, Contemporary Art in Baroda, edited by Gulammohammed Sheikh, Tulika, New Delhi 1997 p. 121
6. Nilima Sheikh,
Ibid, p.102
7. Interview with
the author, Mumbai, March 1990
8. Interview with
the author, Delhi, December 2007
9. Interview with
the author, Delhi, December 2007
10. Interview with
the author, Delhi, December 2007
11. ‘Painting as
Process, Painting as Life ‘Solomon R Guggenheim Museum,
New York, from
October 24, 2014, to February 11, 2015
Presents
Tales Of Transcendance
Dr. Geeti Sen
The paintings exhibited here bring to us some rare and lesser-known aspects in the work of celebrated artists. The majority of Amrita Sher-Gil’s paintings in Paris depict posed studio models, portraits and self-portraits. Her choice to return to live in India was deliberate, and she stated once that in India ‘lay her destiny as a painter’. She responded with different sensibilities to the Indian environment. On returning to India, she painted the hill men and women of Shimla, the peasants of Punjab and Uttar Pradesh.
In
her short-lived career as an artist of just nine years, she accomplished more
than do most painters. Born of a Sikh father and Hungarian mother, Sher-Gil had
imbibed the cultural sensibilities from both parents. Her work reflects radical
changes from the three years when she studied at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in
Paris, after which she returned to India in 1934. From the beginning however,
she knew that she would be an artist. She wrote:
It seems to me that I never began painting, that I have always
painted. And I have always had, with a strange certitude, the
conviction that I was meant to be a painter, nothing else.
Returning to India, Amrita visited her ancestral home in Amritsar, and then her uncle’s vast estate in Saraya. A water colour dated to 1936 suggests her explorations in rural India, focusing on a boy on a swing with his mother seated beside him. The sloping ground of the earth with the impressionistic rendering of trees and a bullock cart introduces a sense of perspective, from the training received in Paris. So also, the muted coloring of the scene is Western rather than Indian.
Another
water color of about this time is again impressionistic in technique, but
richly colored in delineating the warm browns and greens of the Indian
landscape. This composition distinguishes three separate areas of the
background and foreground introducing again the Western perspective. A third
water colour focuses on the house which takes up most of the picture space,
thus reducing the idea of depth and perspective.
These compositions are Amrita’s early explorations in representing the Indian landscape. Her letters to her mother, her sister Indu and to the critic Karl Khandalavala describe her travels through India in 1936, her appreciation of the colossal cave sculptures at Ellora and the murals at Mattancheri, and her meetings with extraordinary people such as Malcolm Muggeridge, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sarojini Naidu. She was arrogant in her dismissal of contemporary painting in India, and she was influenced by the stylistics of Mughal painting.
In June 1938 Amrita left India for Hungary, and much against her parents’ wishes she married her cousin Dr. Victor Egan. By then she was over twenty-five and wished to be independent of them. Several Indians were keen to marry her, but she was reluctant to do so as she felt she could never be an ideal wife. She felt that Victor could accept her on her own terms, primarily as an artist.
One year later in 1939 she painted the portrait of the man she married, which may be her only portrait of him. Victor Egan appears in elegant attire by wearing a dark purple cape over his shirt, with a slight smile on his face as he smokes a cigarette. Sher-Gil was an adept in painting portraits, and she had painted several commissioned portraits for which she received payment. She also made several self-portraits in different poses. This picture however is quite different as it was not commissioned, rendering an informal and sympathetic study of Victor Egan. It is a rare work, returning to Western techniques in realism, as would be natural in such a portrait. As she died in 1941, this may have been Sher-Gil’s last portrait.
Jagdish Swaminathan was a revolutionary artist whose ideas stirred the art world to make a dramatic impact in the 1960s. He aspired to formulate a new visual language which would be rooted in the social and cultural context of his times. He was deeply critical of the principles of modernism, and the imitation of Western styles and techniques. Equally, he was opposed to influences from traditional art, as was to be found with the Bengal school of artists.
In the 1950s he was already writing as an art critic. During these decades he was a political organizer and agitator, who joined the Congress Socialist Party in 1945 and later the Communist Party in 1947. His charismatic personality had much to do with the founding of Group 1890. This group was born in 1962 as a collective of twelve artists who were chiefly from Delhi, Baroda and Bombay. At the heart of their formation was the urgency to re-examine the current state of art, and to innovate a new language which could be described as indigenous modernism.
Their
first and only exhibition was held in October 1963 at Rabindra Bhavan in Lalit
Kala Akademi, Delhi. With much fanfare it was inaugurated by Pandit Jawaharlal
Nehru, with an emotional speech given by the poet Octavio Paz who later became
Mexico’s ambassador to India. It was
with the persuasion and help of Octavio Paz that in 1966 Swaminathan started
his journal called Contra. The Manifesto of Group 1890 began by rejecting not
just the canons of Indian art, the Bengal School and academic realism, but also
the expression of modernism practiced in the 1950s which bore strong influences
from Western art.
In his paintings Swaminathan was deeply inspired by the indigenous art of the Murli and Marli and Warli communities from central and western India. His art absorbed the vibrant colours of earth reds and browns with daubs of yellow and black which appeared and were painted on the walls of their homes. A line of triangles, squiggles and symbols with some times the imprint of hands are brought together in a new visual language, raw and bold in expression -- to create a visual experience unparalleled in the art of his contemporaries.
By the mid-1960s he began to explore the relation of colour to space. He studied Pahari miniature traditions, which are reflected in his series titled Colour Geometry of Space. This was followed by his series on Bird, Mountain, Tree and Reflection, which are to be seen in two images in the collection of the Progressive Art Gallery. The arbitrary demarcation of space, with no suggestion of depth or perspective, creates a radically new idiom. Mountains or rocks are introduced in different hues of blues, beige and green, punctuated by the presence of a bird or a flower. Four of this series of paintings are to be seen here in this exhibition, each of them creating different experiences.
In 1982 Swaminathan was invited to establish the Roopankar Museum of Bharat Bhavan in Bhopal. Significantly, in setting up these galleries he gave equal importance to contemporary urban art as to the tribal art of the adivasis. These were located in two separate wings of the museum which was designed by the architect Charles Correa. Swaminathan continued to serve as Director of Bharat Bhavan in Bhopal till 1992, and he died in 1994.
Swaminathan’s own works of this time reflect the inspiration from tribal art, to be seen in his abstract compositions in mixed media from the later 1980s and early ‘90s. Dots and lines, squares and the triangle are brought together in differing expressions, to formulate an elementary language which aspires to an absolute purity in vision. With these drawings his aim was to attain freedom, spontaneity and individuality. Many contemporary artists in India have created their own visual language, over the seventy-five years since India gained Independence. None of them have been able to defy the visual conventions in art as he did, to create a radically new experience.
Prabhakar Barwe’s abstractions are often minimalist, surprising us in their variations in colour and also in medium. His works vary from using enamel to wood to gouache on paper. Unexpectedly, he introduces an anthropomorphic figure in almost the centre of the composition, flanked by the curving arch of a circle and strips of canvas. Or he can assemble geometric forms together in blue and beige and black – with no narrative being told except the wonder of their creation. He can place a figurine lying horizontally, with a foot and fragments of a female form sketched in below. In another the head of a horse with its fore legs becomes visible, floating in a vacuum of space with forms which are undistinguishable.
The artist is inviting his viewers to complete each painting, to reflect on forms that are deliberately left incomplete and floating in space. There are no precursors for such compositions in Indian art, or for that matter, in contemporary art in the world. Through his images Barwe was aspiring towards attaining a sense of serenity, as well as a sense of balance and purity. His introverted gaze as one could call it, aspires towards the spiritual.
Apart from these abstract compositions is another image entirely different in its sensibility. Barwe creates an elaborate design with two concentric circles enclosing a six-pointed triangle, flanked by smaller geometric patterns. Boldly printed in contrasting colors of black, red and white, this work inspired by Tantric forms is a Sri Yantra, designed for commercial use on silk by a handloom company.
Barwe made several patterns for commercial use, in sharp contrast to the subtlety of his own abstract formulations. Their existence compels us to reflect on his life’s journey, which followed two different trajectories which are almost contradictory in their aesthetics: of his own abstract compositions, and of commercial designs which were commissioned with a different purpose. The collection in the Progressive Art Gallery offers us rare insights into these two polarities in the work of Barwe.
Ganesh Pyne’s paintings arise from a private, inner vision which is poetic rather than realistic. He captures the psyche of Bengal through his enigmatic images of the fisherman casting his net, the river, the fountain, the lamp, the horse and rider. He creates his own mythology, relying on medieval lore rather than his immediate everyday life. As a lonely child his imagination was set alive by tales recounted by his grandmother on dark nights, tales from the medieval mangalas and charya padas. In his painting titled Encounter in the Twilight Zone forms dissolve from tangible reality, from the known and familiar into the unknown.
He wove the fabric of his paintings from the haunting songs of the Bauls, the ‘mad mystics of Bengal’ as they have been called. He represents them in this collection, holding the single string instrument of the ektara with which they sing and dance. Their songs are about the wonders of creation: of journeys along the river in spate and the storm brewing, of the forest and the tiny lamp glowing in the darkness. The Bauls sing in ecstasy, using the metaphors of the lamp and the river.
My heart is a
lamp, floating in the current
drifting to what
landing place I do not know…
Darkness moves
before me on the river…
Both day and night
the drifting lamp moves
searching by the
shore..
Sung by Baul
Gangaram, quoted by Edward Dimock,
The Place of the Hidden Moon, Oxford University Press
The collection in the Progressive Art Gallery offers us a range of paintings from 1957 to the year 2000, following the evolution of his work from early experiments to his mature work. The Money Lender from 1957 already focuses on a single figure seated with his hookah and wooden money box, transforming a mundane subject into one of poignancy. The forms dissolve into tones of yellow, white and beige/ browns, with touches of unexpected green in the face and elsewhere. This richness of palette would be unusual in his later work which restricts itself to fewer and more subtle colours.
Abhimanyu, painted in the year 2000 in tempera, ranks among the finest compositions by Pyne in his mature style. The youngest hero from the Mahabharat appears before us armed with a mighty bow that extends to the entire height of the canvas, with a sheaf of arrows hung from his right shoulder and a dagger dangling from his hip. He is poised and alert, ready for action in the battle which is about to ensue.
Abhimanyu is an arresting and a disturbing figure as he looms up clad in his blue armour, against a background of crimson blood red which hints at the tragic consequences which would follow. As related in the Mahabharat, while still in the womb of his mother Draupadi, he had learnt of the means of how to enter the complex web of the battlefield, the Chakravyudh; but he had not learnt how to exit from the field, which would prove to be his tragedy.
Pyne has chosen to represent the greatest of all heroes in the Mahabharat in his moment of glory; but in that same moment, he appears to be vulnerable. A strange radiance of light shines from within him from no given source, glowing on his face, his broad shoulders and his hands. It is Pyne’s use of light above all else which empowers and transforms his figures, so that beauty is rendered with the realization of pain.
The technique of gouache used in this image of Abhimanyu was Pyne’s forte which he mastered, a technique in traditional miniatures rarely used by contemporary artists. It is an elaborate process which takes time and considerable patience. It is this technique which builds up the surface and texture of the canvas, so that the forms seem to be composed of a thousand particles, like algae or seaweed in the deep ocean.
His representations of women from the year 2000 are not Titled. Their beauty is enhanced by that mysterious glow of light Which outlines the contours of the saree and the hand, the forehead, the lips, the slender necklace which slips down her neck. Light radiates from within these figures, embodying them with a subtle, insistent radiance.
The Metascapes
by Akbar Padamsee are grandiose and sweeping in their vision. They transcend
the conventional representation of specific sites and geographical locations.
He had remarked on this by asserting:
I’m not interested
in location of landscape. My general
theme is nature –
mountains, trees, the elements, and
obviously one is
influenced by the environment, but I’m not
interested in
painting Rajasthan or the desert of whatever (place)…
Padamsee’s paintings evoke an experience which evokes expression and sensation, rather than the cognitive recognition of a landscape. This idea of the ‘sensation’ caused by physical matter can be felt in the two Metascapes in the collection of the Progressive Art Gallery. He developed several devices to suggest the idea of expansion, mirror images being one example. He limited his palette to using just a few primary colours, where the sustained impact of red can be almost violent. His work introduces geometric forms which result in an impact that is both dramatic and dynamic.
The idea of using
the Sun and the Moon in my Metascapes
originated when I
was reading the introductory stanza to
Abhijnanashakuntalam,
where Kalidasa speaks of the eight
visible forms of
the Lord.. the sun and the moon as two
controllers of
time.. water as the origin of all life, fire as the
link between man
and god and the earth as the source of
all seed… when the poetic meaning is superimposed upon
the sign a new
form arises which belongs to the mind of the
artist, not to the
natural environment.
In
1969 Padamsee received the Nehru Fellowship for Visual Arts. He decided to make
a film with the funds, and to set up an interactive workshop called the Syzgy
project which involved other artists. He was the most intellectual artist among
all his contemporaries, and he introduced a geometric foundation to his
Metascapes. He was inspired by the
paintings and the writings of the artist Paul Klee. He would quote the passage wherein Klee would
compare a work of art with the growth and the transformation of a tree.
From the root the
sap rises up into the artist, flows through
flows to his
eyes. He is the trunk of the tree and
overwhelmed
by the force of
the current, he conveys his vision into his work.
In full view of
the world, the crown of the tree unfolds and
spreads in time
and space, and so with his work. Nobody
will
expect a tree to
form its crown in exactly the same way as its
root. Between above and below there cannot be
mirror images
of each other…
While his Metascapes lie beyond the rendering of landscape, he did make drawings in black and white of mountains and water, introducing occasional perspective in them. These are not preparatory sketches to his Metascapes, but instead they are to be valued for their originality in the evolution of Padamsee’s work. Once again, as with his Metascapes, these drawings are not realistic studies but born from the imagination. Shamlal, Editor of the Times of India, had a special interest in the visual arts, and he was a connoisseur in appreciating contemporary art. He had remarked that “by restricting himself to greys, like the Chinese masters who confine themselves to the various shades of black, Padamsee strikes the richest vein of poetry in his art.”
Towards the last decade in his life, from about the year 2002, Padamsee returned to creating portrait studies in black, greys and white. He was the only painter who confined himself to creating portraits in this restricted palette, by using a strong outline and with dots spread all over the paper-within and beyond the profile of the faces. The results of this technique bring a strange and savage intensity to these works. Yet it is not clear as to whether these are charismatic portraits of actual people, or as is more likely, are they studies of generic types.
In
maintaining the artist’s right in creating his own vision, Padamsee would
respond with the lines quoted from Paul Klee, that Art does not render the
visible; rather, it makes visible.
(January 1913 – December 1941)
Amrita Sher-Gil, often called the “Pioneer of Modern Art in India,” remains a seminal figure in the history of Indian art. Born in Budapest in 1913 to a Hungarian mother and an Indian Sikh father, Sher-Gil’s mixed heritage significantly shaped her artistic identity and how she interpreted the world around her.
Amrita Sher-Gil’s art is renowned for its extraordinary depth and emotional intensity. She possessed an innate ability to capture the essence of her subjects, whether it was the rural life of Indian villagers, her own self-portraits, or the sensuous nudes that marked her later works. Her paintings often embodied a sense of introspection and contemplation, and she had a unique ability to infuse her canvases with a vibrant palette that drew viewers into her world.
Tragically,
Amrita Sher-Gil’s life was cut short at the young age of 28 in 1941. However,
her legacy endures. Her contributions to Indian art remain unparalleled, and
her influence on subsequent generations of artists is immeasurable. Sher-Gil’s
artistic vision was not just a reflection of her time; it transcends time and
continues to resonate with art lovers and scholars worldwide. Her work remains
a source of inspiration, a testament to the power of art to transcend borders,
and a reminder of the profound impact a single artist can have on the cultural
narrative of a nation.
(April 1928 – January 2020)
Akbar
Padamsee, a distinguished and versatile Indian artist, stands as a luminary in
the realm of modern Indian art. Born in 1928 in Mumbai, he embarked on a
creative journey that spanned several decades and embraced many mediums,
establishing his place as an influential figure in the Indian art landscape.
Padamsee’s art is a testament to his ceaseless exploration of form, medium, and subject. He was a visionary who traversed a spectrum of styles, from the early figurative to the later abstract and from oils to watercolours. His work continually evolved, reflecting a deep commitment to innovation and a relentless pursuit of the essence of his subjects.
Akbar Padamsee’s oeuvre extends beyond his artistic creations. He was also a thinker and a philosopher of art. He co-founded the Vision Exchange Workshop in the 1960s, a collective of artists, architects, and other creative minds which aimed to foster interdisciplinary dialogues on art and design. This exemplified his commitment to nurturing artistic communities and expanding the horizons of artistic discourse.
In addition to his artistic endeavours, Padamsee’s impact was significant as an art educator and advocate for artistic expression. His contribution to the cultural milieu of India was profound, influencing not only the art world but also those who looked up to him as a mentor and guide.
Akbar Padamsee’s legacy extends far beyond his canvases; it is woven into the very fabric of Indian contemporary art. His remarkable artistic vision, his ceaseless innovation, and his contributions to artistic thought and practice make him a towering figure, and his work continues to inspire and captivate art enthusiasts and scholars alike. His legacy is a testament to the enduring power of art to challenge conventions and transcend boundaries.
(June 1937 – march 2013)
Ganesh Pyne, an enigmatic and profoundly influential figure in the world of Indian art, is celebrated for his haunting and evocative works that delve into the depths of the human psyche. Born in 1937 in Kolkata, Pyne’s art defies easy categorization, occupying a unique and mystical space in the realm of contemporary Indian art.
Pyne’s art is characterized by its intricate detailing, rich symbolism, and a deep connection to folklore and mythology. He was a master of the tempera medium, which allowed him to create finely detailed, luminous works with an otherworldly quality. His paintings often feature eerie, enigmatic figures who appear real and ethereal, traversing the boundaries between the living and the supernatural. Pyne’s mastery of technique and his ability to imbue his works with an unsettling atmosphere sets him apart as an artist of rare brilliance.
The artist’s oeuvre is deeply introspective and introspective, exploring themes of life and death, beauty and decay, and the human condition. Pyne’s works often straddle the fine line between reality and the world of dreams and the subconscious, inviting viewers to contemplate their own inner landscapes and the enigmatic nature of existence.
Ganesh Pyne’s art is also deeply rooted in the cultural traditions of Bengal, drawing inspiration from its rich literary and artistic heritage. He frequently referenced the works of great poets and writers like Rabindranath Tagore and satirical illustrations from the “Hungry Generation” literary movement.
Ganesh
Pyne’s passing in 2013 marked the end of an era in Indian art, but his legacy
endures. His works continue to captivate art enthusiasts and scholars alike,
inspiring them to delve into the depths of the human psyche and the mysteries
of life and death. Ganesh Pyne’s contribution to the world of art is a
testament to the enduring power of creativity and the ability of an artist to
challenge conventions and awaken the innermost recesses of the soul.
(March 1936 – December 1995)
Prabhakar Barwe, an Indian artist born in 1936, remains a significant figure in the realm of modern art, celebrated for his distinctive style and deep introspection. Barwe’s journey as an artist traversed a path of simplicity, purity, and an unwavering commitment to exploring the extraordinary in the everyday. His art is a testament to the power of minimalism and the subtle, often overlooked nuances of existence.
Barwe’s work is characterized by its seemingly simple compositions that invite viewers to engage with the ordinary in extraordinary ways. His choice of everyday subjects like windows, doors, and chairs served as a canvas for profound introspection and reflection on the mundane. Barwe’s compositions are a testament to his mastery of minimalism, capturing the quiet beauty and the stillness that often goes unnoticed.
The artist’s distinctive use of vibrant colors, particularly shades of blue, imbued his works with a unique atmosphere. These hues symbolize the infinite and the cosmic, evoking a sense of calm and introspection that defines his art. Barwe’s palette and forms have an almost meditative quality, allowing viewers to transcend the mundane and delve into the inner depths of their consciousness.
Barwe’s influence extended beyond his artistic creations. He was a prominent figure in the Indian art community, serving as a teacher, mentor, and advocate for artistic expression. His association with the Progressive Artists’ Group and his contributions to the field of art education left an indelible mark on the evolving landscape of Indian contemporary art.
Tragically, Prabhakar Barwe’s life was cut short at the age of 59 in 1995, but his legacy endures. His unique artistic vision, minimalistic approach, and profound introspection continue to inspire art enthusiasts, scholars, and artists alike. His art challenges viewers to find depth in simplicity and to appreciate the extraordinary in the everyday, a testament to the enduring power of art to transform our perception of the world around us.
(June 1928 – April 1994)
Jagdish
Swaminathan, a remarkable Indian artist, made significant contributions to the
realm of modern Indian art during the latter half of the 20th century. Born in
1928 in Simla, India, Swaminathan’s art is celebrated for its vibrant and
spiritual exploration of nature, drawing inspiration from the rich cultural
heritage of the country.
Swaminathan’s artistic journey was deeply influenced by his early training as a botanist, which imbued his work with a profound connection to the natural world. His art is characterized by a vibrant and rhythmic exploration of India’s flora and fauna, often infused with spiritual mysticism. His canvases celebrate the organic and the cosmic, with recurring motifs of birds, animals, and the iconic ‘Bindu,’ a spiritual and cosmic symbol in Indian culture.
The ‘Bindu’ series is perhaps the most emblematic of Swaminathan’s artistic philosophy. These abstract compositions feature a single, radiant dot at their centre, embodying the idea of unity and oneness. Swaminathan’s exploration of color and form within the ‘Bindu’ series invites viewers to contemplate the deep spiritual connections that underpin the natural world.
As one of the founding members of the “Group 1890,” Swaminathan played a pivotal role in championing the cause of indigenous and folk art in India. His advocacy for tribal art forms and his involvement in the Bhopal-based Bharat Bhavan Art Centre contributed significantly to the revival of traditional Indian art practices and the recognition of tribal artists.
Jagdish
Swaminathan’s art embodies his enduring fascination with India’s cultural and
natural diversity. His colorful, rhythmic compositions are a reflection of his
spiritual outlook and his deep reverence for the beauty of the natural world.
Despite his untimely passing in 1994, Swaminathan’s artistic legacy continues
to inspire a new generation of artists, inviting viewers to reconnect with the
sacred and the profound within the world surrounding us. His works stand as a
testament to the power of art to celebrate the unity between human existence
and the vast cosmos.
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