Still Life (Pineapple)

During the 1950s, P. T. Reddy made several still-lifes arranged sometimes in a formal Mughal style, or with bowls of fruit in the European format, as seen in this painting. He used colour in all its intoxicating complexity and paints here a still-life with all the tropes of the genre—fruit platters, a vase with a floral arrangement, other empty plates, and tabletops— and makes it a painting that is emblematic of his dogged determination to not only master the genre but also have an intense engagement with colour.