Satish Gujral

 ‘… Satish Gujral is one such artist whose personal circumstances have contributed manifestly in his evolution as an artist. His early experiences with nationalistic politics, childhood deafness, the idealization of his elder brother and his art training have enriched his art to the extent that he may be considered the Renaissance man of contemporary art. A painter, a muralist, an architect, a sculptor, he is perhaps the most versatile and innovative artist of his times’.

- Seema Bawa, Artimes, New Delhi, Inaugural Issue, January 2000

(G. Sinha et al (ed.), Satish Gujral: An Artography, Roli Books, New Delhi, 2006, p. 131)

With his lifelong experimentation of media and expression, Gujral’s passion for creative ingenuity permeates every phase of his nearly 70-year long career. Each decade saw Gujral re-imagine new ideas and mediums, whether the dark and anguished painterly renditions of refugees in the 1950s, his colourful collage and mixed media works of the 60s, the burnt wood sculptures of the 70s, or the residential, architectural projects he undertook in the 80s. The current lot forms part of a later phase in the artist’s career, where, from the 1990s, ‘Man and beast, woman and bird, musicians and jugglers [took] centre stage’, all rendered through the artist’s mystical, curvilinear forms. (A. Jhaveri, Guide to 101 Modern and Contemporary Indian Artists, India Book House Pvt Ltd., Mumbai, 2005, p. 34-35)

In the current lot, Gujral reveals the overlapping and almost intertwining lines of a kneeling woman and surrounding rams. The composition presents the figure and animals as existing within one continuous harmonious narrative, with the woman almost magically undergoing a fantastical metamorphosis with her menagerie, reminiscent of the artist’s anthropomorphic granite sculptures. The painting exists on a plane of mythical reality akin to the epic scenes of Mughal miniatures, executed here on a grand, abstracted scale.

In 1998, Gujral was fitted with a cochlear implant, having lost his hearing decades before in his childhood. The implant resulted in him becoming hypersensitive to noise, and it was removed after only two years. Gujral noted the impact this experience had on his painting, with the overlapping lines of his subjects recalling the sensory pandemonium he experienced with the implant. This is felt in the current lot, where the forms of the woman and rams are entwined, and Gujral’s concepts of the abstract and figurative bleed into one. The rams in the background almost dissipate into vapour-trails, perhaps evoking a cacophony of sounds traveling through the air.