The Supreme Consideration is Man

Like many other modernists who have created their version of Mahatma Gandhi in their art, Haku Shah, too, pays homage to the Father of the Nation through this oil on canvas. The stance—Gandhi donning just a simple white loincloth and sitting on a rug—is familiar and iconic. The artist’s positioning of the charkha resembling a halo deifies Gandhi. He is shown holding a pencil—an ode to the story of how Gandhi favoured a small pencil gifted to him by a small child over any other modern, expensive writing tools.