Untitled (Self-portrait)

Every artist, including the most introvert, paints a self-portrait at some point. While there are those whose self-portraits became quite famous, such as Vincent van Gogh, and M. V. Dhurandhar closer home, others like Jamini Roy didn’t seem to lay much store by it as works such as this are quite rare. This late career work—evident from the shock of white hair and puckered facial skin—hints that the artist was not much comfortable with the spotlight on himself; he chose to look away from the painter’s eye. The impressionist strokes of the background and his white kurta are proof of his Western training in art that he had discarded early in his career.