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Lot Essay
As a young painter Rameshwar Broota was consumed with empathy at the suffering he saw in Indian society. The male figure has played a central role throughout the artist's career, becoming a site for conflict and its resolution in Broota's themes. Broota's ouevre reads as an almost Darwinian study through the ages of man both in an evolutionary and moral capacity. This began with Broota's early humorous depictions of anthropomorphic apes represented as occupying positions as pillars of society.
"Satirical in nature, it showed up the moral vacuum, with baboons and their ilk occupying positions of responsibility, therefore literally monkeying around as guardians of mankind, as policemen, having discussions on the state of the nation [...] sitting on sofas." (K. Singh, ed., Manifestations 5: 20th Century Indian Art, New Delhi, 2011, p. 42)
The Game aims its sardonic mockery at the political establishment. Painted in 1978, shortly after the twenty-one month (state of) Emergency came to a close in India, this work is still fresh with the political upheavals that affected the subcontinent at the time. Broota uses amiable almost cartoon-like apes sitting back to back in the midst of decorative concentric circles of apes dancing. It is as if they are in the midst of a ridiculous game of musical chairs, a game where one ape will lose and the other will necessarily win everything. Broota uses witty undertones to reveal how the state at the time trivialised such clear of the injustices in society.
"Satirical in nature, it showed up the moral vacuum, with baboons and their ilk occupying positions of responsibility, therefore literally monkeying around as guardians of mankind, as policemen, having discussions on the state of the nation [...] sitting on sofas." (K. Singh, ed., Manifestations 5: 20th Century Indian Art, New Delhi, 2011, p. 42)
The Game aims its sardonic mockery at the political establishment. Painted in 1978, shortly after the twenty-one month (state of) Emergency came to a close in India, this work is still fresh with the political upheavals that affected the subcontinent at the time. Broota uses amiable almost cartoon-like apes sitting back to back in the midst of decorative concentric circles of apes dancing. It is as if they are in the midst of a ridiculous game of musical chairs, a game where one ape will lose and the other will necessarily win everything. Broota uses witty undertones to reveal how the state at the time trivialised such clear of the injustices in society.