Atul Dodiya

‘Gandhi forms a continuous link referentially through which Dodiya builds an ancestry in art.’

 - Ranjit Hoskote

Painted in 1997, Bapu Observing a Cow is an early example of Atul Dodiya’s famed depictions of Mahatma Gandhi and closely relates to the artist’s landmark series 'An Artist of Non-violence', produced in the late 1990s. First exhibited in 1999 at Gallery Chemould, Bombay, these largescale watercolours formed an 'extended homage' to Gandhi and used historic photographic images as their foundation. (R. Hoskote, Atul Dodiya, Prestel, Munich, London, New York, and Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi, 2013, p. 33). Seminal examples include Bapu at René Block Gallery, New York, 1974 (1998) and Sea-Bath (Before Breaking the Salt Law) (1998).

The current lot was executed a year prior, and by contrast to the watercolours, is rendered in acrylic on canvas, on small-scale. The intimate scene depicts Gandhi, fondly referred to as ‘Bapu’, gazing upon a cow. He stands before a small group of figures and a rural building, behind which looms a black cloud. 

Gandhi famously called the cow ‘a poem of pity’,  ‘the mother to millions of Indian mankind’. (Mahatma Gandhi quoted in R. K. Prabhu and U. R. Rao, The Mind of Mahatma Gandhi, Jitendra T Desai Navajivan Mudranalaya, Ahmedabad, p. 481) He considered the cow a central symbol of Indian society and a number of famous photographs exist of Gandhi beside the animal. The present work, executed in Dodiya’s signature sepia tones and almost photo-realist style, has the effect of a developing photograph.