Watercolour, ink, oil pastel and marker on paper pasted on Masonite board
In Avinash Chandra’s humanscapes, it was the profusion of nude figures—suggestive of an orgy—that arrested the viewers’ imagination. Standing, sitting, lying down, in profile or fully-frontal—they were objects of play, almost like mannequins, a feast for the senses, more sensual than sexual. It was a reflection of the liberated times in London, revolutionary freedom from a previous prudishness, that permeated his canvases. It also brings to mind suggestions of psychotropic drugs and hallucinogenic substances prevalent during those times of the ‘hippie culture’.
published references
Singh, Kishore, ed., Manifestations VII: 75 Artists | 20th Century Indian Art (New Delhi: DAG, 2012), p. 41-42 Singh, Kishore, Humanscapes: Avinash Chandra, A Retrospective (New Delhi: DAG, 2015), pp. 128-129, 131 Singh, Kishore, ed., The Naked and The Nude: The Body in Indian Modern Art, Edition Two (New Delhi: DAG, 2015), pp. 222-223 Singh, Kishore, ed., Ways of Seeing: Women Artists | Women as Muse (New Delhi: DAG, 2021), p. 237
Avinash Chandra
Untitled
1963
Watercolour, ink, oil pastel and marker on paper pasted on Masonite board
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Avinash Chandra
Untitled
1963
Watercolour, ink, oil pastel and marker on paper pasted on Masonite board
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