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Lot Essay
"I got involved with painting the rear of trucks with the huddle up and dehumanized cargoes of labourers, a common enough sight in the country. Since the men at the back acquired the character and colour of the cargo that they were carrying, it was only appropriate that they and the tortuous machines be painted in monochrome. A series of grey and dusty pictures were painted." - Krishen Khanna
From the early 1970s, Krishen Khanna’s work engaged with urban life as he experienced it in the rapidly expanding metropolis of Delhi, particularly through subaltern figures like the bandwallahs and manual labourers he encountered. In his Rear View series of paintings, for example, the artist “depicts the hard life of rural migrant labourers who form an important part of the urban landscape, in the late hours of the day when the privileged step out for a night of entertainment. Covered with dust, their identity obscured by a thick veil of grime, the figures in these monochromatic paintings seem to disappear into the fold of the city to which they migrated in the hope of a better life [...] the truck becomes an on-the-spot home, on the move, emphasising rootlessness as well as alienation.” (R. Karode and S. Sawant, ‘City Lights, City Limits – Multiple Metaphors in Everyday Urbanism’, Art and Visual Culture in India 1857-2007, Mumbai, 2009, p. 198) Important works from this series are part of the permanent collections of the National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi, as well as the Jehangir Nicholson Foundation in Mumbai.
From the early 1970s, Krishen Khanna’s work engaged with urban life as he experienced it in the rapidly expanding metropolis of Delhi, particularly through subaltern figures like the bandwallahs and manual labourers he encountered. In his Rear View series of paintings, for example, the artist “depicts the hard life of rural migrant labourers who form an important part of the urban landscape, in the late hours of the day when the privileged step out for a night of entertainment. Covered with dust, their identity obscured by a thick veil of grime, the figures in these monochromatic paintings seem to disappear into the fold of the city to which they migrated in the hope of a better life [...] the truck becomes an on-the-spot home, on the move, emphasising rootlessness as well as alienation.” (R. Karode and S. Sawant, ‘City Lights, City Limits – Multiple Metaphors in Everyday Urbanism’, Art and Visual Culture in India 1857-2007, Mumbai, 2009, p. 198) Important works from this series are part of the permanent collections of the National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi, as well as the Jehangir Nicholson Foundation in Mumbai.