Important Notice

Lot 78

Born in Mumbai in 1934, Bhupen Khakhar worked as a chartered accountant before turning to painting and moving to Baroda in the early 1960`s. An entirely self-taught artist, Khakhar developed a highly personal narrative in his figurative works, focusing on small-town life in India and the experiences of the country`s great middle-class. As his work references popular culture, in their depictions of traditional rituals and rites of passage, the... Born in Mumbai in 1934, Bhupen Khakhar worked as a chartered accountant before turning to painting and moving to Baroda in the early 1960`s. An entirely self-taught artist, Khakhar developed a highly personal narrative in his figurative works, focusing on small-town life in India and the experiences of the country`s great middle-class. As his work references popular culture, in their depictions of traditional rituals and rites of passage, the artist`s vivid oils and watercolors magnify these experiences along with those of his everyday life, highlighting the universal threads running through them.

After a visit to England in 1979, when Khakhar publicly acknowledged his homosexuality, his images took on the progressive and often bold politics of his life as a gay activist. Through the male figure, frequently images of the white haired artist and his partner, Khakhar challenged social mores and popular perceptions, "speaking for a class and a world hitherto unregarded, unrecorded" (Timothy Hyman, Bhupen Khakhar, Chemould Publications and Arts, Mumbai, 1998, p. 68). In these works, including the present lot, a monumental acrylic painting on patterned fabric, gay relationships were portrayed no differently than heterosexual ones – tender and governed by the same human emotions of love and desire. Here, we see a celebration of the love shared between Khakhar and his partner through a series of vignettes of their life together.

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