Important Notice

This luminous, gestural painting from 1965 titled 'Mosaic Female' reflects the masterful combination of Indian aesthetics with certain aspects of modern Western styles like Cubism that M.F. Husain achieved early in his career. As the artist grandly stated in an early radio interview, "In the name of cubism I tried to invent a new order, and I didn't need the linear limbs of Nataraj to hold its image on its toe in order to continue the dance of... This luminous, gestural painting from 1965 titled 'Mosaic Female' reflects the masterful combination of Indian aesthetics with certain aspects of modern Western styles like Cubism that M.F. Husain achieved early in his career. As the artist grandly stated in an early radio interview, "In the name of cubism I tried to invent a new order, and I didn't need the linear limbs of Nataraj to hold its image on its toe in order to continue the dance of the Creator-Destroyer" ("A.I.R. 4 July, '69", M. F. Husain, Pundole Art Gallery exhibition catalogue, 1970, not paginated). This coming together of influences played an important role in the evolution of the artist's well-known vocabulary, and continues to be a hallmark of his distinctive and celebrated idiom.

Focusing on the female form, a leitmotif that occupied the artist's attention over the course of his long career, even as this painting offers a nod to schools of modern European art, it highlights the classical Indian art forms that deeply informed Husain's work. While the deconstruction of the figure along multiple planes and its illumination from various angles is reminiscent of the work of Cubists like Braque and Picasso, her graceful posture recalls traditional Indian dance forms, temple sculptures and even folk art. Similarly, the strong, vibrant palette draws from Rajasthani miniature painting traditions.

The present lot also underscores the mastery Husain had achieved with line and form by the late 1950s. Though he uses it economically, the artist "...wields a quick nervous line of great sensitiveness and energy. It is a versatile line, capable of both power and poetry. It divides his forms in firm definition, broods amongst his grouped figures…It lurks in women's faces in tender almost tentative hint, or threads sharply across his compositions like a scalpel, separating one figure, one face from the other in subtly differentiated tones of colour, as though he sculpted his figures from paint" (Shiv Kapur, Husain, Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi, 1961, p. iv).

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