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Lot 53

 

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“My horses, like lightning, cut across many horizons. From the battlefield of Karbala to Bankura terracotta, from the Chinese Tse Pei Hung horse to St. Marco’s horse, from ornate armoured Duldul to [the] challenging white of Ashwamed... the cavalcade of my horses is multidimensional.” - M F HUSAIN

Though M F Husain explored various animals through his art, he had the greatest fascination for the horse till the very end. As observed... “My horses, like lightning, cut across many horizons. From the battlefield of Karbala to Bankura terracotta, from the Chinese Tse Pei Hung horse to St. Marco’s horse, from ornate armoured Duldul to [the] challenging white of Ashwamed... the cavalcade of my horses is multidimensional.” - M F HUSAIN

Though M F Husain explored various animals through his art, he had the greatest fascination for the horse till the very end. As observed in the present lot, his horses are vivacious creatures. They are rarely static and are often captured in motion. “The horses are rampant or galloping; the manes, the fury, the working buttocks, the prancing legs, and the strong neighing heads with dilated nostrils are blocks of colour which are vivid or tactile or are propelled in their significant progression by strokes of the brush or sweeps of the palette knife. The activity depicted is transformed in the activity of paint.” (Ebrahim Alkazi, M F Husain: The Modern Artist and Tradition, New Delhi: Art Heritage, 1978, p. 3)

They encapsulate a complex and diverse plethora of cultural and artistic references that have played a vital role in shaping the artist’s idiom. Husain painted his horses with the same frenetic energy that they represent through their bucking and rearing postures. In his oeuvre, they are an amalgamation of both Indian and Western influences. “I have not seen these wild animals in the jungle. I have seen them imprisoned in stone on the walls of Khajuraho, Konark, Mahabalipuram – the temples of medieval India.” (K Bikram Singh, Maqbool Fida Husain, New Delhi: Rahul & Art, 2008, p. 169)

Husain’s horses often appear as both a narrative and metaphorical element in his works. His preoccupation with this subject developed from a wide range of encounters with the animal during early childhood experiences in Indore, where he saw horses drawing tongas or in Muharram processions. Later, his study of horses from the Chinese Sung dynasty, the terracotta folk traditions of Bankura and cave art, and the work of Western artists such as Franz Marc and Mario Marini added nuance to his precise lines and the portrayal of complex emotions. Husain incorporates these influences seamlessly to create paintings in his own inimitable style. His horses are archetypes and “... subterranean creatures. Their nature is not intellectualised: it is rendered as sensation or as abstract movement, with a capacity to stir up vague premonitions and passions, in a mixture of ritualistic fear and exultant anguish.” (Richard Bartholomew and Shiv S Kapur, Husain, New York: Harry N Abrams Inc., 1971, p. 43)

Using strong lines and thick brushwork, Husain imbued his equine figures with a sense of mythic power and virility, as vehicles for change in the world. In doing so, he created an equestrian form symbolic of passion, loyalty, and freedom that was unique to his artistic vocabulary.

The present lot exemplifies Husain’s ability to harness the vigour and elegance of horses through a masterful use of line and colour. Light and shadow add another dimension to the bucking and rearing horses whose frenzied energy is barely contained within the painting. “He creates a dynamic equilibrium between two contrary movements of looking back and running forward.” (Singh, p. 179) It is perhaps due to this that the horses in the present lot represent “some of his finest work and demonstrate[s] the power of his draftsmanship, his deep understanding of the myths associated with the horse in the multi-faceted Indian artistic and cultural tradition and his talent to invest them with a new contemporary meaning.” (Singh, p. 192)

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