Important Notice

Lot 15

 

Quick Zoom

"He had gone to the city [Benaras] to interpret its visual experience in terms of colour and forms. The confrontation was intense-the doorways, arches and steps were his themes. The meander of forms constituted a dramatic structure. He noted the structure of the city as a relic, its wharfage and have for the philosophy of death and passage of time." (Richard Bartholomew, "Thought", 11 Mar.1961, qtd in Ram Kumar: A Journey Within, New Delhi:... "He had gone to the city [Benaras] to interpret its visual experience in terms of colour and forms. The confrontation was intense-the doorways, arches and steps were his themes. The meander of forms constituted a dramatic structure. He noted the structure of the city as a relic, its wharfage and have for the philosophy of death and passage of time." (Richard Bartholomew, "Thought", 11 Mar.1961, qtd in Ram Kumar: A Journey Within, New Delhi: Vadehra Art Gallery, 1996, p102)

This painting from 2010 revisits Kumar's tryst with Benaras. The paradox that Varanasi embodied- birth and death, piousness and corruption-intrigued Ram Kumar. Here, this paradox assumes the palette of contrasts. Perspective is warped; Kumar "...addressed himself to the formal aberrations of mismatched planes, jamming the horizontal perspective...and locking the muddy, impasto-built riverbank constructions into a Cubist geometrical analysis." (Ranjit Hoskote, "The Poet of the Visionary Landscape", Ram Kumar: A Journey Within, New Delhi: Vadehra Art Gallery, 1996, pp37- 38) Kumar's works oscillate between concrete, recognisable scenes with warped planes giving a sense of architectural anomaly, and more abstract, metaphysical representations of the holy city. The revival of architecture and more tangible forms is evident in this work.

Read More
Artist Profile
Other works of this artist in: this auction  |  entire site