Osian's Auction Catalogue Indian Modern Fine Arts | June 2017

38 # J. Sultan Ali (1920 – 1990) Penance Oil on canvas, 1963 Signed in Devanagari ‘Ali’ & s/d ‘Sultan Ali 1963’ l.c. 30.0 x 36.1 in (76.3 x 91.6 cm) Provenance Formerly with Mrs. Sali Sultan Ali, New Delhi, thereafter with a Private Collection in Canada, from where it was sold at Sotheby’s and acquired by the present owner. INR 400,000 – 600,000 USD 6,250 – 9,375 They are figurative but not in an old-fashioned way or a consciously modern way. There are people, things, creatures and situations in Sultan Ali’s paintings. Also, there are two planes of time. The past persists in the form of traditional images. These form the background generally. The serpents, the bulls and the elephants are mostly semi-latent. They are not the salient motifs. As the fabric of the background they refer to the symbolism of ritual and of conventional cults of worship… I mentioned ‘mood’ earlier. This is built through subtle tones and finely worked subsidiary images. Some of these are accidental blots that are so well-controlled that they still appear to be emergent. Others are precisely drawn with very fine calligraphic lines. Reprinted in ‘ Thought , 8 January 1966’. Indian Modern Fine Arts | 97