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

57 Bimal Dasgupta (1917 – 1995) Untitled Oil on canvas, 1980 S/d ‘B. Das Gupta 80’ verso 24.0 x 24.0 in (60.0 x 59.8 cm) Provenance Purchased directly from the artist by Dhoomimal Art Gallery. INR 300,000 – 450,000 USD 4,688 – 7,031 Lot 57 From my childhood I was fascinated with the beauties enshrined in nature, and thus landscapes and myriad other things in nature became subjects of my paintings… as the quest for expression continued, I seem to have discovered my subjects in the nature itself. Rocks of different hues and shapes, moss, fossils, different kind of growths on sea beds, weeds, corals, and sand dunes fascinate my imagination and constitute my subjects. I get in them the messages of a different world, which I try to interpret through the interplay of colours and forms… There is no end for a quest. Even at the evening of my life today I continue with the same zeal. The enchanting beauties of nature which inspired me to become an artist still holds the same sway for me and provide me with immense scope for my work. Bimal Das Gupta rpt. in Artist’s Brochure .1988. It is his creative faculty that in the end almost magically transforms things. If he wipes off reality considerably, he not just attempts abstracted forms, but presents the end-products tinged in colourful visions as well. The artist now moving further towards abstraction, virtually succeeds in altogether eliminating, for instance human figures or suggestions of the sort, in most of the pictorial compositions. Yet the viewer feels attracted and close to a known world. While the stress on lines is comparatively less as can well be understood, colour this time attains an added importance. In the process the artist leaves ample proof of his fine sense and easy dexterity in handling application of colour. For him not necessarily the rainbow hues, with a sombre sort too, he can move in a fanciful manner. Bimal Dasgupta indeed is capable of and actually moves from height to height with the rare confidence of a master artist. Ajit Kumar Dutta rpt in Recent Paintings by Bimal Dasgupta AIFACS Gallery ExC 1993. Indian Modern Fine Arts | 127