Abstract #1

In the Sixties, many artists from India were turning to the genre of abstraction, Mohan Samant among them. A talented associate of the Progressive Artists’ Group, Samant didn’t break away completely from figurative conventions but evolved a new pictorial vocabulary, combining his fondness for various mediums and textures with abstract forms, as seen in Abstract #1. This roughly textured work has a relief-like quality, which recalls the continuing traditions of folk and mural art. It is layered and is a fusion of the abstract and his own painterly expression.