Untitled

Paritosh Sen was one of the most dynamic painters of the twentieth century, mixing Indian and western vocabularies that he learned over the course of his life. Sen was only twenty-five years old when the Bengal famine broke out. His works from this period describe the horrors he witnessed as a young man, as villagers were forced to leave their homes and travel to the city, hoping for survival. Here, we see two beggars next to each other on the ground. The younger boy sleeps while the older man is awake, staring directly at the viewer in the hope of receiving alms. Both visages appear bony and thin due to malnourishment.