Search results for: 'ganesha in paintings'

Calcutta, flourishing with commerce and maritime trade during the nineteenth century, was regarded as the ‘second city’ of the British Empire. People thronged there in large numbers to make a livelihood, or in holy pilgrimage, seeking blessings at the Kali temple at Kalighat that had been re-built in 1809. Annada Prasad Bagchi Bamapada Banerjee B. C. Law C. W. Lawrie Kshetradas Chitrakar Panchanan Karmakar Madhav Chandra Das Ramadhan Swarnakar Ganganarayan Ghosh Nritya Lal Datta Press Kristohurry Das Chorebagan Art Studio Kansaripara Art Studio Calcutta Jubilee Art Studio Bat-tala

This historic exhibition based on the association twenty-seven Indian artists had with art institutions, museums and art movements in Paris throws light on France as a cradle of modernism and what Indian artists gained from this relationship. Akbar Padamsee Amrita Sher-Gil Anjolie Ela Menon Arun Bose Chintamoni Kar Himmat Shah Jehangir Sabavala Jogen Chowdhury K. K. Hebbar Kanwal Krishna Krishna Reddy Laxman Pai Laxman Shrestha Nalini Malani Nasreen Mohamedi Nirode Mazumdar P. Khemraj Paritosh Sen Prodosh Das Gupta Prokash Karmakar Rajendra Dhawan Ram Kumar Sailoz Mukherjea Sakti Burman Sunil Das Syed Haider Raza V. Nageshkar V. Viswanadhan Zarina Hashmi

This exhibition looks at the diverse range, moods and styles that primitivism has taken in India, some artists practicing entirely in that style, while others experimenting with it in part, or sporadically. One can count simplicity and a move away from sophistication as key components, as also an inclination or at least a nod towards the folk. The exhibition does not attempt to be a comprehensive survey of India’s primitivists—there are others who would bear inclusion—but is an attempt to understand a body of work and how, given its Western countenance, it can be understood in the Indian context. More than anything else, it offers a clearer view than in the past of what primitivism might mean in the context of modern Indian art. Amrita Sher-Gil F. N. Souza George Keyt Himmat Shah J. Sultan Ali Jamini Roy Jogen Chowdhury K. G. Subramanyan K. S. Kulkarni M. F. Husain Madhvi Parekh Mohan Samant Rabin Mondal Rabindranath Tagore Ramkinkar Baij Sunayani Devi

The nude. Just the term sends a frisson of excitement down the spine in most people. For the few of us who are part of the art fraternity, however, more than just the anticipation of being able to view the human body as an artistic work in its many forms and avatars, its beauty and its degradation both, is the true mark of an artist’s genius. And yet, the history of the nude in Indian art has remained curiously unmapped. A. A. Almelkar A. A. Raiba A. P. Bagchi A. Ramachandran Abalall Rahiman Akbar Padamsee Anita Roychowdhury Anupam Sud Avinash Chandra B. Prabha B.Vithal Bengal School (Anonymous) Bikash Bhattacharjee Chintamoni Kar Chittaprosad F. N. Souza G. R. Santosh George Keyt Gogi Saroj Pal Gopal Ghose Hemendranath Majumdar J. Sultan Ali Jamini Roy Jaya Ganguly Jehangir Sabavala Jeram Patel Jogen Chowdhury Jyoti Bhatt K. H. Ara K. K. Hebbar K. Laxma Goud K. S. Kulkarni L. Munuswamy Laxman Pai M. F. Husain M. R. Acharaker Madhav Bhattacharjee Maniklal Banerjee Nalini Malani Navjot Nikhil Biswas P. Khemraj P. T. Reddy Prodosh Das Gupta Prokash Karmakar R.Vijaivargiya Rabin Mondal Radha Charan Bagchi Rameshwar Broota Ramkinkar Baij Ranbir Kaleka Ravi Varma Press Rekha Rodwittiya S. Dhanapal Sakti Burman Satish Sinha Sudhir Khastgir Suhas Roy Sunil Das Sunil Madhav Sen Surendran Nair V. Nageshkar Ved Nayar

Prabhakar Barwe (1936-95) could well have ended up a theoretician whose book 'Kora Canvas' (Blank Canvas) was a manifesto that established the multi-dimensional relationship between an artist, the object on which he paints, and his subjects. That he was not just an intellectual scholar but an artist whose work speaks for him, is evident through a range of works in which Barwe dissects our understanding of the world and how we view it. Taking commonplace objects and our perception of their existence in the space they occupy, he shifts the dialogue to a point of discomfiture that makes us question our understanding of them. Using scale, discordant juxtapositions, and displacements, he reimagines the everyday in a manner that is thought-provoking, even provocative, as alternate realities—whether perceived or imagined.

William Hodges (1744-97) was a pioneer in more ways than one. He was the first British landscape painter to visit India, and to portray scenery across the whole breadth of the Gangetic plain. As a writer, he gave the first detailed descriptions of numerous historic Indian buildings, and he theorised about the origins and evolution of Indian architectural design. His art illustrates his exploration into terrain which—in its breadth and scope—was at the time almost as unfamiliar to Indian as to Western eyes.

Gogi Saroj Pal, seen often as one of the first ‘feminist’ women painters in modern Indian art, has consistently explored the condition and inner life of women. Women’s lives, their desires and compulsions, and the complex and magical world of the feminine have been Gogi’s frequent subjects. In her work, Gogi explores and responds to the vast reserve of myths, fables and lore that abound in India, interested in excavating, in particular, its religious and literary traditions. She traces and frequently creates new mythical/celestial female beings of great strength and potency, such as the Hathyogini-Kali—skilled yoga practitioner and potent female force—who assert themselves in a modern landscape where women are frequently denied agency.

An ancient civilisation, India was always prized for her fabled wealth—textiles, crafts, spices—her knowledge—literature, scholarship, universities—and her culture—music, dance, theatre, art. It is the only country with an unbroken tradition in each of these disciplines extending all the way back to the Indus Valley Civilisation. Ambadas Anonymous (Kalighat Pat) Arun Bose Asit Kumar Haldar Avinash Chandra B. Prabha Balraj Khanna Bikash Bhattacharjee Bimal Dasgupta Biren De Chittaprosad Company Painting D. P. Roy Chowdhury Early Views of India G. R. Santosh Ganesh Haloi Himmat Shah J. Sultan Ali Jamini Roy Jeram Patel K. S. Kulkarni Krishna Reddy L. Munuswamy M. F. Husain M. Suriyamoorthy Natvar Bhavsar Nikhil Biswas P. T. Reddy Paritosh Sen Prodosh Das Gupta Prokash Karmakar Prosanto Roy Rabin Mondal Rajendra Dhawan S. G. Vasudev Sakti Burman Sanat Kar Sankho Chaudhuri Satish Sinha Shanti Dave Shyamal Dutta Ray Sunayani Devi Sunil Das Sunil Madhav Sen V. Viswanadhan

Much of Indian modernism is enriched by the work that some of its best known artists produced after they had left the country, choosing as home another land. F. N. Souza was among the first to leave, in 1949, to head for London, where a successful practice catapulted him to the top of Britain’s artists. He was followed, in 1950, by S. H. Raza, who settled in Paris, winning the coveted critics’ award (Prix de la critique) in 1956, while others such as Krishna Reddy (Paris and New York), S. K. Bakre (London), Sakti Burman (Paris), Avinash Chandra (London and New York), Mohan Samant (New York), Natvar Bhavsar (New York), V. Viswanadhan (Paris), Sohan Qadri (Copenhagen), Rajendra Dhawan (Paris), Eric Bowen (Oslo), Ambadas (Oslo), and Zarina Hashmi (New York), followed in the 1950s-70s. These fourteen artists, with their diverse styles and concerns in art making, are masters lauded for the sheer range of responses to their environment that their work has registered. However, the question this exhibition forefronts, as its curator Kishore Singh asks, is: ‘Does the artist’s ethnic identity mean art too has an ethnic identity?’ Ambadas Avinash Chandra Eric Bowen F. N. Souza Krishna Reddy Mohan Samant Natvar Bhavsar Rajendra Dhawan S. H. Raza S. K. Bakre Sakti Burman Sohan Qadri V. Viswanadhan Zarina Hashmi