Search results for: 'Flower and Fire The Life'

The exhibition features several works of academic realist portraiture from early 20th century—vivid oil portraits by masters of the form such as Pestonji Bomanji, M. F. Pithawalla, Baburao Painter and L. N. Taskar as well as charcoal sketches by M. V. Dhurandhar, an academic artist of renown of the same period. The selection features Western academic oil-influenced works on mythological themes by the school referred to as Early Bengal and two works painted in a Raja Ravi Varma-derived style—an anonymous work by the Ravi Varma ‘School’ and Aroomoogam Pillay. A. A. Almelkar Abalall Rahiman Abani Sen Akbar Padamsee Ambadas Anonymous (EarlyBengal) Anonymous (Portraiture ) Anupam Sud Aroomoogam Pillay Avinash Chandra Baburao Painter Badri Narayan Bijan Choudhary Bikash Bhattacharjee Biren De Chintamoni Kar Chittaprosad D. P. Roy Chowdhury Devyani Krishna Dharamnarayan Dasgupta F. N. Souza G. R. Santosh G. Ravinder Reddy Ganesh Haloi Gogi Saroj Pal Gopal Ghose H. A. Gade Himmat Shah J. Sultan Ali J. Swaminathan Jamini Roy Jeram Patel Jogen Chowdhury Jyoti Bhatt K. H. Ara K. K. Hebbar K. Laxma Goud K. S. Kulkarni K. V. Haridasan Kshitindranath Majumdar L. Munuswamy L. N. Taskar Laxman Pai M. F. Husain M. F. Pithawalla M. V. Dhurandhar Madhvi Parekh Mukul Dey N. S. Bendre Nandalal Bose Nasreen Mohammedi Nicholas Roerich Nikhil Biswas P. Khemraj P. T. Reddy Paritosh Sen Pestonji E. Bomanji Prosanto Roy Rabin Mondal Ram Kumar Ramkinkar Baij Ravi Varma ‘School’ S. H. Raza S. K. Bakre Sadequain Sailoz Mukherjea Shanti Dave Shyamal Dutta Ray Sohan Qadri Sudhir Patwardhan Sunil Das Sunil Madhav Sen Tarak Garai Ved Nayar Walter Langhammer

It is strange that Natvar Bhavsar, one of Indian art’s leading names, should never have been shown in India before. Having lived and worked in USA from 1962 onwards, it remains a mystery why his work has been seen in America but almost not at all in India. In spite of a few eminent collectors who have his work, Bhavsar has remained inexplicably ignored—an anomaly DAG is happy to correct with this seminal exhibition.

For Shanti Dave, creativity is a consistent and persistent exploration of the word or akshara—a term defined in the Natyashastra as a stroke in musical notes—which he perceives as the source of all creation. Dave’s abstract iconography, beginning in the early 1950s, adapted to modernism, aesthetic continuity and transcultural exchange. He altered, rejected and improvised the archaic image into a resonant form resembling an ancient script.

The mid-twentieth century saw a churn in the practice of art in India with a number of artists beginning to explore a genre that had swept the West with its absence of figuration in favour of abstraction. The non-representational began to gain traction as artists found within it a way to express themselves purely through colour as a potent tool to communicate emotions. Abstraction emphasised the relationship between originality and expression in ways that were complex, leading one to debate about the eventual goal of art. Ambadas, Krishna Reddy, Sohan Qadri, Zarina Hashmi, Rajendra Dhawan

Most shows at DAG take time to develop because of the quality of research and scholarship they require to mount, but even by our own exacting standards, Continuum has taken longer than most. This, a retrospective in a sense of the six artists who formed the Progressive Artists’ Group, is seminal because it is for the first time since 1950 that the six artists forming the core group have been brought together in an exhibition of their works. The Progressives have become the rallying point for the modern movement in Indian art, and are considered among the most important artists of the last and current century. Of these, M. F. Husain, F. N. Souza and S. H. Raza dominate the market. Alongside, works by their contemporaries K. H. Ara, H. A. Gade and S. K. Bakre, who have largely been seen to have underperformed in comparison, will help re-draw such distinctions and place them on the same platform as their better-known peers. It will re-define their historical importance and gain them the recognition that is their due. Maqbool Fida Husain M.F.Husain Hari Ambadas Gade Syed Haider Raza Krishnaji Howlaji Ara Sadanandji k. Bakre Francis Newton Souza

England shaped Altaf’s political consciousness as well as his persona. He engaged in the anti-apartheid demonstration at Trafalgar Square held against the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela; a peaceful protest at the American Embassy opposing the bombing in North Vietnam; the Aldermaston March against the nuclear bomb; the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament; he became a member of the Youth Wing of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) and the Young Communist League (YCL). Any examination of the theoretical aspect of Altaf’s work must start with the knowledge that the work in question exemplified an element of ‘existentialist’ thought. 

The exhibition brings together important works of art spanning a wide range of genres, forms, periods and styles. They are grouped by genre and each thematic arrangement features a select collection of artworks that are milestones in Indian modernism, as well as in the development of the artistic language of several of the participating artists. A. A. Raiba Abalall Rahiman Akbar Padamsee Ambadas Amitava Avinash Chandra B. C. Sanyal B. N. Arya Baburao Painter Benode Behari Mukherjee Bikash Bhattacharjee Bipin Behari Goswami Biren De Chittaprosad Devyani Krishna Dharamnarayan Dasgupta Early Bengal (Anonymous) F. N. Souza G. R. Santosh Ganesh Haloi Ganesh Pyne George Keyt Gieve Patel Gogi Saroj Pal Gopal Ghose H. A. Gade Hemanta Misra Himmat Shah Indra Dugar Indu Rakshit J. P. Gangooly J. Sultan Ali Jamini Roy Jeram Patel K. H. Ara K. K. Hebbar K. Laxma Goud Kshitindranath Majumdar Laxman Pai M. F. Husain M. F. Pithawalla M. V. Dhurandhar Manu Parekh Mohan Samant N. R. Sardesai Nandalal Bose Nikhil Biswas P. Khemraj P. S. Chander Sheker P. T. Reddy P. V. Janakiram Paritosh Sen Pestonji E. Bomanji Prabhakar Barwe Prodosh Das Gupta Prokash Karmakar Rabin Mondal Rabindranath Tagore Radha Charan Bagchi Ram Kumar Ravi Varma School (Anonymous) S. Dhanapal S. G. Thakur Singh S. H. Raza S. K. Bakre Satish Gujral Shanti Dave Shiavax Chavda Shyamal Dutta Ray Sohan Qadri Sunil Das Surendran Nair Tyeb Mehta V. Nageshkar Vivan Sundaram

The Devi or the female power in Hindu mythology appears in various avatars in our everyday lives—as idols during the puja, on covers of magazines, product labels, calendars and posters. The modern history of visualising the Devi goes back to naturalistic depictions in oil paintings by the Early Bengal artists, which were surpassed in popularity and fame by Raja Ravi Varma and his studio. His representation, however, was regarded as too human-like by artists of the Bengal School in the early twentieth century, who created idealised forms based on a synthesis of classical visual traditions. In the twentieth century, we find artists responding to distinctive traits of the goddess to portray specific aspects of her power, or to convey the artist's own relationship with divinity. Few artists who have turned to Hindu myths have been able to escape the temptation to interpret the female power in their own way, and the diversity in style, medium, and mood is a testament to that.

India’s Rockefeller Artists showcases iconic works of the Indian painters and sculptors who travelled to the US on philanthropic grants from the JDR 3rd Fund (1963–1979) and later through the Asian Cultural Council. These artists were exposed to American art and shared their own learnings and experiences through these enriching cultural exchanges. The show examines how and why these artists were selected; their relationships with each other and the American art milieu; the impact of the experience on their work; and the creation of a community of Rockefeller artists.

The idea of primitivism centres on the wish to identify with, or respond to, elements of a society that are deemed ‘primitive’. In artistic terms, it is about rejecting realism, simplifying technique and reducing the formal means of expression to a ‘primitive’ state. The term itself is borrowed from discussions of Western art, where high-profile examples include the images of Tahiti and its people made in the 1890s by Paul Gauguin, and responses to African sculpture by Pablo Picasso in 1906-09. The second thread of primitivism—the reduction of formal means—is best exemplified by the ‘cut-outs’ made by Henri Matisse in the 1940s.

‘Iconic Masterpieces of Indian Modern Art, Edition 02’, the second iteration of DAG’s annual exhibition that redefines the concept of modernism in the Indian context, will be on view in New Delhi this month. Timed to coincide with the launch of its new gallery in the capital, ‘Iconic Masterpieces’ brings together the finest instances of art created in the country by Western and Asian travelling artists and Indian masters spread a little over two centuries. Selected for their rarity, historicity, and excellence, each work of art in this exhibition marks the zenith in terms of the quality of art created in different periods and styles in the subcontinent.

Chittaprosad (1915 – 1978) was an artist of the people. A firm believer in the power of political art to bring tangible change in society, he is remembered for political cartoons and caricatures lampooning the ruling elite while championing the cause of the working class.

He was also a dedicated journalist working for the Communist Party of India (CPI) and was sent by the party to document the effects of the Great Bengal Famine of 1943 in Bengal’s villages and towns. He would come back with harrowing stories and sketches of hunger and death and publish them in the CPI’s journal People’s War, something that would prove to be extremely important in the face of British censorship on news about the famine.

Post-Independence, Chittaprosad distanced himself from the CPI due to ideological differences and moved to the outskirts of Bombay. He continued registering protest through his art but focussed increasingly on art for children. He setup a puppet studio, Khela-ghar and created beautiful retellings of epics and folk tales in print.