Osian's Auction Catalogue Indian Antiquities Modern Contemporary Fine Arts and Books | April 2017

83 Nataraj Sharma b.1958 Bus to Dhamla Oil on canvas, 1989 Signed ‘NATRAJ SHARMA’ on verso Inscribed ‘June 15-16-22-30-1 July 1-2’ on verso 48.0 x 32.0 in (121.9 x 81.3 cm) Provenance Acquired by Osian’s-Connoisseurs of Art from Saffronart.com Auction, 6th Sept 2007; Lot 30 INR 1,200,000 – 1,800,000 USD 17,910 – 26,870 Nataraj’s paintings press their claustrophobic space onto us. Packed in buses, trains, small cafes; cramped in city dwellings. trapped in their own thoughts, a slice of humanity is framed and held to close scrutiny. Physical compression is a proxy to psychological states. Not being able to see beyond their noses they are intensely preoccupied with themselves, scarcely aware of each other’s presence. The sense of the individual’s alienation in a crowd is heightened; personal psychological tensions project themselves in impersonal public confrontations. Artificial city lights are given a dramatic color. The light signals: reflecting off the surface of bodies and objects, picking out volumes, throwing deep shadows, it configures a web of nerves on the picture surface. In refraction, it splinters the solidity of masses, heightens the tilts and dips of perspective and exposes the subject matter to bare view. But this is simultaneously countered by the verticals and horizontals of metal rods, windows, walls and ceilings that weld figures and objects Into a tight fit. There is a resultant tension between man and his environment, the pressing of flesh against hard, concrete materials: the grip of hands on bycycle handlebars, a cheek against the metal of a bus, the face against the window. As if seeking affirmation of the human presence in a world of objects. ..., the psychological manipulation of space-the paradox of people crammed so tightly they can barely move, yet we experience each person in isolation. The singular, personal nature of their thoughts is explicit in particularised portraiture. A twitch of muscle, a grimace, the tilt of a head, the trace of a smile are all rendered in detailed study to serve as precise clues to the hidden self. The relationship between the impersonal. external locale and the private self is indicated by the strange quality of fight whose source is invariably an electric bulb-street lamps, green lights inside a bus, blue ones in a train or the reds of a restaurant. These tinted glows create a nocturnal atmosphere, halfway between wakefulness and sleep. As in the realm of dream there is a vividness and clarity of experience. – Rasna Bhushan, rpt. in Exhibition Brochure (6-14 March 1990), ‘Paintings of Nataraj Sharma’ Gallery 7, Bombay; 1990. detail