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Lot Essay
It was with fellow artist M.F. Husain that Ram Kumar first visited Varanasi in 1960 to sketch his impressions and experiences of the famed holy city on the banks of the River Ganges. In 1996, he recalled, “I had gone to Benaras for the first time about 35 years ago [...] Every sight was like a new composition, a still life artistically organised to be interpreted in colours. It was not merely outward appearances which were fascinating but they were vibrant with an inner life of their own, very deep and profound, which left an everlasting impression on my artistic sensibility. I could feel a new visual language emerging from the depths of an experience." (Artist statement, Ram Kumar: A Journey Within, New Delhi, 1996, p. 89) It was this philosophical experience that heralded a marked change in Kumar’s work in the early 1960s, perhaps the most significant development over the course of his career. Abandoning his figurative idiom, the artist began to concentrate on what the critic Richard Bartholomew termed "the mood and sensation of the landscape’. (R. Bartholomew, ‘Ram Kumar’s hallmark of maturity", The Times of India, 10 December, 1977)
In the present lot, the intricate architecture of the city’s riverbanks and famous ghats appears to float in the ethereal river, its abutting forms almost spilling over into the water, revealing the unique and complex urban grid that fascinated the artist. Here, the spectral city is emptied of inhabitants and yet full of depth and contrasts, as Kumar inserts jagged forms of brilliant white and cyan against a subtle camaieu of greys and greens to provide perspective to the composition and reflect the cohabitation of swirling life and still, silent grief he observed in the city. Using an impressionist artistic device, Kumar represents his personal experience of the city rather than a literal vision of it, with only few traces of representational forms remaining to mirror its joy and melancholy. At once fertile and desolate, these dueling forces and the emotive landscape of Varanasi profoundly resonated with Kumar, described by Bartholomew in 1961 as “a quiet man, a quiet painter, and a painter of the remembrance of things past.” (R. Bartholomew, The Art Critic, New Delhi, 2012, p. 135)
Kumar, also a writer and poet, would persist for over forty years in portraying the complexity of Varanasi in his painting through its timeless architecture and its stark contrasts, particularly that between divinity and mortality, the celebration of life and the rituals of death. He recalls “Why Benares and not some place else? It was at that point in my life, I happened to visit Benares and it was all there before me... Benares' uniqueness lies in its age-old associations and the faith of millions. During my several visits to this city, my effort has been to fathom a little of its mysterious depths which I could interpret in my paintings.” (Artist statement, Ram Kumar: A Journey Within, New Delhi, 1996, p. 191)
For further discussion of the artist's Varanasi landscapes please refer to lots 425 and 435.
In the present lot, the intricate architecture of the city’s riverbanks and famous ghats appears to float in the ethereal river, its abutting forms almost spilling over into the water, revealing the unique and complex urban grid that fascinated the artist. Here, the spectral city is emptied of inhabitants and yet full of depth and contrasts, as Kumar inserts jagged forms of brilliant white and cyan against a subtle camaieu of greys and greens to provide perspective to the composition and reflect the cohabitation of swirling life and still, silent grief he observed in the city. Using an impressionist artistic device, Kumar represents his personal experience of the city rather than a literal vision of it, with only few traces of representational forms remaining to mirror its joy and melancholy. At once fertile and desolate, these dueling forces and the emotive landscape of Varanasi profoundly resonated with Kumar, described by Bartholomew in 1961 as “a quiet man, a quiet painter, and a painter of the remembrance of things past.” (R. Bartholomew, The Art Critic, New Delhi, 2012, p. 135)
Kumar, also a writer and poet, would persist for over forty years in portraying the complexity of Varanasi in his painting through its timeless architecture and its stark contrasts, particularly that between divinity and mortality, the celebration of life and the rituals of death. He recalls “Why Benares and not some place else? It was at that point in my life, I happened to visit Benares and it was all there before me... Benares' uniqueness lies in its age-old associations and the faith of millions. During my several visits to this city, my effort has been to fathom a little of its mysterious depths which I could interpret in my paintings.” (Artist statement, Ram Kumar: A Journey Within, New Delhi, 1996, p. 191)
For further discussion of the artist's Varanasi landscapes please refer to lots 425 and 435.