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

The large abstract series of oil applied with roller and painting knife on canvas created in 1962 represented a very significant turning point in the artistic evolution of V.S. Gaitonde. His May 1963 Notes to the MoMA Artist Questionnaire were helpful in understanding the aesthetic wisdom, that Gaitonde was seeking as an artist at that point in time: “I work as an individual. I do not have a scientific point of view; it is mostly my total experience of life [and] nature that comes through me, that is manifested on canvas. For me every painting I do is a miracle... So I cannot really form a philosophy. It is my sincere belief in life, truth, God, whatever it is that prompts me to paint...” Then moving onto some of the specific paintings in the 1962 Series he adds: “ The painting [Painting No.4] was done on wet white with [a] roller and painting knife... The study of ‘Zen’ has helped me to understand nature, and my paintings are nothing else but the reflection of nature. I want to say things in few words. I aim at directness and simplicity.” The Gaitonde quotes are reprinted from ‘Artist Collection Files, Painting & Sculpture Department, The Museum of Modern Art’, which were reprinted by Sandhini Poddar in V.S. Gaitonde: Painting as Process, Painting as Life. New York: Solomon R. Guggenheim & Prestel 2014; p.27-28. Further, the progress of the colour palette within the 1962 series clearly shows the progression towards the grays and related variations from the more ‘brighter’ pigments used in the earlier artworks of the 1962 series, which is also reaffirmed by one of the first vertical format canvases inspired directly post this period in 1963 [Refer to Plate 28; p.76 Poddar 2014] and even deeply influencing his palette well into 1965 with masterworks such as the painting on page 142 illustrated in Vasudeo Santu Gaitonde: Sonata of Silence, [conceptualised by Jesal Thacker & Authored by Meera Menezes. Bodhana Arts & Research Foundation 2016 with support by Raza Foundation]. To get a fuller sense of Gaitonde’s aesthetic sensibility it is important to view counterpoints to familiar present day arguments, best represented by art critic D. Nadkarni who wrote one of the earlier monographs on the artist published by the Lalit Kala Akademi in 1983. Formerly from the Collection of Eminent Art Scholar & Critic Dr. Charles Fabri (1899-1968) & noted museologist Ratna Fabri (1921–1972). “The role of Zen in Gaitonde’s art is likely to be exaggerated. He is not the type of painter to wait for either, and emotional influence or a philosophy to propel him. If we study Gaitonde’s work over the past three decades or so, it is not difficult to detect a certain logicality in the direction taken by his art. It was inexorably moving towards a state of contemplation. It was not that he discovered Zen but that there was an inevitable meeting between a way of thinking and a mind continuously exploring its relationship with the external world. About Zen it is said that it leaves “the open space to be filled in by the mind”. But it does not set the mind thinking; it only causes itself to poise on what it knows. Zen believes that the humblest of things, when meditated upon, can give rise to the most astounding intuitions, even in a moment. A bit of crumpled string or paper, or the edge of a leaf, can inspire the greatest intuitions of understanding or of beauty. From this point of view, one may venture to identify the mysterious motifs, the highly personalized hieroglyphs, in Gaitonde’s canvases with manifestations of such intuitions. What appears to me more important is the fact that Gaitonde has consistently moved forward during this long and major phase of his career, inching as it were his way forward through subtle mutations. Only occasionally has one found him trying a manner with some tentativeness, as when he had started “framing” the canvas surface itself with broad swathes of colour. “ Dnyaneshwar Nadkarni’s Introductory Essay, rpt. in Gaitonde . New Delhi: Lalit Kala Akademi 1983. He finally adds: “One is tempted to call his canvases monochromatic but that can be quite misleading, considering the luminousness of his colours and the variations they are subjected to. Another convenient phrase for describing his painting is “spiritual”; and it goes with “peace”. But it is not distinctive enough and, besides, Gaitonde’s canvases have a very strong physical, often sensuous, identity which one would like to connect with his personality... I believe that pictorial art and non-objective art progresses in alternating waves. Gaitonde has stood like a rock in the sea of fashion. His achievement is as real as it is historic.” Dnyaneshwar Nadkarni’s Introductory Essay, rpt. in Gaitonde . New Delhi: Lalit Kala Akademi 1983. Along with this Gaitonde canvas, Charles & Ratna Fabri had collected an impressive array of ancient, classical and medieval Indian art from the Mohen-jo-daro and Harappan period, along with many 11th and 12th century sculptures, with a sprinkling of modern artists, such as Amrita Sher-Gil (who shared her Hungarian descent with Charles), Dhanraj Bhagat, Satish Gujral, Bhupen Khakhar, and a few others, most gifted, but some purchased on the frequent visits to the Black Partridge, Kunika-Chemould & Shridharani Galleries during the 1960s. 92 | Osian’s–Connoisseurs of Art