Important Notice

Since the 1960s, the main subjects of Bikash Bhattacharjee’s work have been the common folk and events of his native city of Kolkata. Painting the city’s joys and sorrows, the artist used his surreal canvasses to elevate beggars, prostitutes and street performers to an existence beyond their own circumscribed lives.

The present lot, a large monochromatic canvas, belongs to a suite of works that juxtaposes the life of a beggar... Since the 1960s, the main subjects of Bikash Bhattacharjee’s work have been the common folk and events of his native city of Kolkata. Painting the city’s joys and sorrows, the artist used his surreal canvasses to elevate beggars, prostitutes and street performers to an existence beyond their own circumscribed lives.

The present lot, a large monochromatic canvas, belongs to a suite of works that juxtaposes the life of a beggar with that of a king, commenting on the fleeting nature of wealth and power and voicing disillusionment with the current state of urban society. Here, a gaunt, blind king sits alone, clutching his crown as if it were his only possession, almost like a begging bowl. No longer a powerful figurehead, this old ruler seems to have been abandoned to age, time and fate by his people.

Speaking about this series of canvases, Manasij Majumder, the artist’s biographer, notes, “In 1994 Bikash exhibited a suite of oils titled King, comprising portraits of imaginary characters, young and old, each looking the earliest native of the earth, nature’s direct offspring. Call them tribal or primitive; their ethnic features have no geographically local identity. Each wears a crown, a sign either of their fierce independence, pride of their native culture or of their stubborn willpower to reject persistently the modern day civilisation which has largely dispossessed them of their natural habitat ruled by elemental forces” (Close to Events, Niyogi Books, New Delhi, 2007, p. 210).

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