Osian's Auction Catalogue The Osianama Series |February 2013

112 1958 “Sunil’s handling of line soon crystallized into this elemental force, animating the strokes he laid- either with brush, conte or charcoal stick – to briskly evoke a figure or form. He didn’t want to delink his line from its primary representational function because as a second year student, he was yet to explore an undefined space for his art, entirely free of its engagement with reality. He also needed a subject that would visibly exude, in its contours and physical facets, speed and force in both dynamic and static form. One afternoon on his way back from the Maidan he noticed a posse of policemen, each mounted on a finebred horse, trotting elegantly amidst the crowds streaming out of the nearby playground where a football match between two of Calcutta’s leading teams had finished. Sunil had once seen a mounted policeman near his Kalighat home when he was just a kid of 10. Then he had been more overawed by the policeman in the khaki uniform than the noble animal. But this time his eye was riveted not onto the policemen but their mounts. He traced, not merely with his eyes but with imaginary conte sticks in his hand, the effortless and graceful gait of the horses, their royal manes, their shining black or roan croups, flashing in every brawny facet of the flanks vigour and energy even when they trotted in a most leisurely stride… For the next few months, with the affectionate indulgence of all the members of the Calcutta Mounted Police, Sunil spent most of his free time… at the stable, capturing in the liveliest conte strokes every mood and movement of the horses. They grew such a rapport between the young artist and his subjects that the 56 Sunil Das b. 4 August 1939 Racing Horse Series Conte & Charcoal on paper pasted on cardboard, 1958 S/d in Bengali ‘Sunil Das 20.1.59’ l.l. and S/d in English ‘Sunil 58’ on verso 30.4 x 21.9 in (77.2 x 55.6 cm) Condition Board brittle, paper damaged along edges Provenance Private Collection of the Artist ` 250,000 – 500,000 US$ 4,550 – 9,100 GBP 3,125 – 6,250 moment Sunil arrived…’The one I would fix my sight on would behave excitedly and pose for me’ claims Sunil. Very soon he started producing an astonishing range of drawings in large format, each one of a horse, or horses, exuding the raw vibrant primal vigour of the animals, in dark chiseled strokes as well as smudges and stains of charcoal and conte… Sunil’s achievements stunned both his teachers and his contemporaries at the art college…When Sunil participated in this art event (The Lalit Kala Akdemi National Awards) of national importance, he was undoubtedly the youngest of the artists to do so. It was something of a dream to have his works selected for the LKA Annual and he had expected nothing beyond that… (yet) he had won the prestigious national award of the LKA… That was the year 1959. Sunil hasn’t looked back since then. On his ‘horses’ he galloped all the way to national fame.” – Majumdar, Manasij [2005]. Art Moves: Works by Sunil Das . New Delhi: Delhi Art Gallery; pp7-9, also various illustrations of drawings from the same series as these Lot 56 & 57]