'We had just got back from Hussains [sic] exhibition-opening, when we saw your telegram. So back we rushed once again, and Hussain [sic] assured us the ‘bathers’ isn’t sold and he will keep it for you. Many others were already sold, so thank heavens we got there in t.mes . His exhibition is a tremendous (Fabulous, to use your favourite expression) success.'
– Indrani Rahman (noted dancer and friend of the family) in a letter to Patwant Singh, 30 November 1957
Maqbool Fida Husain’s Bathers depicts a group of women at their ablutions. This theme was famously pursued by Paul Cézanne through the congregating nudes of his Bathers series from the early-twentieth century. Despite Husain’s established choice of subject, his interpretation remains unique, and this work is a bold and modern demonstration incorporating elements of anecdotal classicism. Husain himself has commented on his female figures:
“One reason I went back to the Gupta period of sculpture was to study the human form – when the British ruled we were taught to draw a figure with the proportions from Greek and Roman sculpture… That was what I thought was wrong… In the east the human form is an entirely different structure… the way a woman walks in the village there are three breaks… from the feet, the hips and shoulder… they move in rhythm… the walk of a European is erect and archaic.”
(D. Herwitz, Husain, Tata Steel Publications Co. Ltd. Bombay, 1988, p. 17)
Painted in 1957, Bathers dates to a period when Husain produced a number of compositions depicting rural Indian scenes, such as Marathi Women, Women at Work, and the most famous of them all, Zameen. ‘Husain’s nudes of this period are abstractions, occasionally tender but for the most part curiously aloof and impersonal.’ (D. Herwitz, Husain, Tata Steel Publications Co. Ltd., Bombay, 1988, p. 42)
The elegant women in Bathers are starkly infilled with white, blue, red, and grey, each holding a distinct pose, some seated and some standing in counterpoise. This work is particularly compelling; a mesmerizing and avantgarde representation of old age rituals.
