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Lot Essay
It was in the late 1960s, on a French government scholarship in Paris, that Prokash Karmakar "found his true grounding as an artist [...] He grew increasingly sensitive towards Picasso, becoming inspired by his depictions of violence and his paintings of bullfighting. The theme struck a chord with Karmakar, who had witnessed armed violence during the Partition protests. The suppressed agitation in his mind translated in the painted image being distorted and contorted, even though the subject matter remained perceptible." (India's French Connection, Indian Artists in France, exhibition catalogue, New Delhi, 2018, p. 384)
In this monumental painting, dark, flattened figures of women and horses bring this 'suppressed agitation' to the surface, conveying the personal losses and political horrors the artist experienced growing up an orphan in pre-Independence Calcutta. "Segmented like jig-saw puzzles" these shadowy nightmarish figures "evoke feelings of agony and turmoil. The artist is essentially rooted to a world of reality. In terms of mental attitude at least, he reminds us of Oskar Kokoschka, who too refused to turn abstract. Kokoschka again had a strong sense of social consciousness, for he believed that fashionable art in a way alienates man from man; he 'searched for a way forward, a way of releases' as Berger put it. Prokash too 'tries to liberate' - in what he sees - a bird, a horse and more often in figures. His art is, for all purposes, a protest. To him things are not just to be accepted and circumstances are never final. Though at times disillusioned and even depressed, Prokash does not lose heart. He is uncompromising and never gives up. If the 'investigation of reality' is typical of the twentieth century, Prokash, no doubt, has attempted it in his own way and as such deserves to be discussed and watched." (A.K. Dutta, 'Prokash Karmakar', Lalit Kala Contemporary 17, New Delhi, 1974, p. 22)
In this monumental painting, dark, flattened figures of women and horses bring this 'suppressed agitation' to the surface, conveying the personal losses and political horrors the artist experienced growing up an orphan in pre-Independence Calcutta. "Segmented like jig-saw puzzles" these shadowy nightmarish figures "evoke feelings of agony and turmoil. The artist is essentially rooted to a world of reality. In terms of mental attitude at least, he reminds us of Oskar Kokoschka, who too refused to turn abstract. Kokoschka again had a strong sense of social consciousness, for he believed that fashionable art in a way alienates man from man; he 'searched for a way forward, a way of releases' as Berger put it. Prokash too 'tries to liberate' - in what he sees - a bird, a horse and more often in figures. His art is, for all purposes, a protest. To him things are not just to be accepted and circumstances are never final. Though at times disillusioned and even depressed, Prokash does not lose heart. He is uncompromising and never gives up. If the 'investigation of reality' is typical of the twentieth century, Prokash, no doubt, has attempted it in his own way and as such deserves to be discussed and watched." (A.K. Dutta, 'Prokash Karmakar', Lalit Kala Contemporary 17, New Delhi, 1974, p. 22)