Christie’s brings a stellar Indian suite to Mumbai

Abstract masters VS Gaitonde and Biren De, a slew of divine Ganesh Pynes a kinetic set of KK Hebbars, a gorgeous butterfly by Jogen Chowdhury and an enchanting Meera Mukherjee sculpture this collection at the Christie’s preview in Mumbai on April 8th to  11th is a beauty to behold.They will go under the hammer in the  first Dedicated South Asian Modern + Contemporary Sale at Christie’s London since, 2019 Sublime Shadows, will be part of a live auction. A bouquet of Indian masters will be up for grabs in a market waiting to acquire blue-chip wonders.

Ganesh Pyne’s gorgeous gravitas

Years ago, after seeing Ganesh Pyne’s works of surreal splendour wrapped in stories of poignant passion Honore de Balzac wrote: “ Beauty in art is perfection of form, depth of meaning, profound knowledge of the subject, and the consequence of the artistic idea conveyed by the work. An accurate and impressive copying of life does not produce beauty. “You are not a lowly copyist but a poet.”

Nishad Avari states that Ganesh Pyne’works from the 1970s are central to Sublime Shadows including The Fisherman. Following two consecutive world-record results in the New York sale on 25 March, the collection features a range of works – from large tempera-on-canvas paintings to smaller sketches. These pieces reveal his singular “poetic surrealism,” drawing on Bengali folklore, mythology, and memory. Pyne’s works are uncommon at auction and attract strong international interest, representing the pinnacle of his carefully cultivated visual language. It is the sombre colours, and the cross hatched layers that add their own fascinating terrain of textural nuances along with a mood of melancholic meanderings of thought.

Two abstract masters

The next two masters are Indian abstract contemplative thinkers Vasudev Gaitonde and Biren De. Gaitonde’s canvas bathed in a chromatic sunset. His contemplative realms draw us into the domain of both fascination with multiple areas of atmospherics, and he leaves us viewers guessing about his deeper insights into the spaces that lie beyond the human eye.

Gaitonde laboriously rendered his canvasses in translucent as well as opaque  layers of oils as he sat and watched the sea and captured colour tones within the weaving of both light and colour to set a mood of reverie that drew attention to the great Mark Rothko, who said: “Silence is so accurate.”

The second abstract master Biren De creates his own index of luminous zones in his  painting 1972 that captures the cosmic echo and relies on the way he was able to weave dimensions of light and colour through a unique process so as to set a meditative mood within and without. For De it wasn’t about crispness of contours; it was about finding a softened aura of shades and shadows to echo paradigms of Purusha Prakriti. The depth came within the singularity of each unearthly petal of consciousness. The beauty of the intensity is held in the reflections that seem like ripples of meditative symbolism in the spaces of silence. This image has an equation that makes us think of the sun and of the mandala, as well as the vortex of intricate layers within the earth’s core.

Jogen Chowdhury’s Butterfly  

India’s figurative master and pedagogue from Shantiniketan Jogen Chowdhury’s Butterfly is an eclectic work that embodies not the beauty of the butterfly but it plays on his love and continuous insights into the illusion of volume within the womb of an  idyllic lightness.His Ganesha too is a robust rendition of his love for both mass and material mood and the connotations of man and myth in a reflective residue of time.

Kattingeri Krishna Hebbar

Indian master KK Hebbar’s works in this sale is topped by an exotic flame coloured Untitled (Gulmohar Tree), from 1962 reflects his deft handling of compositional character along with a unique synthesis of figuration and abstraction, demonstrating his modernist vision.The tree in its luscious bloom is an evocative echo of April being Earth Month and it has about it a botanical brilliance that is both rare as well as resonant.His other works too have a fine narrative art history’s lineage in terms of vintage vitality.

Meera Mukherjee

India’s mistress of the bronze world, Meera Mukherjee’s lithe linearity and love for novel compositions that reflect rural rhythms set in a modernist mood is seen in her Untitled (Wheel Builders). Her transition from studying and adapting traditional Dhokra (lost-wax) casting techniques into modernist idioms from everyday subjects she experienced during her time with the tribals is a work that transcends time. Within the supple creation of symbolism, we sense her distinctiveness in creating works of the core of rural rhythms highlighting the strength and influence of labour all over the world, the simplicity and aura of human ethos in movement, and the dignity of man who leads an ordinary life.