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拍品专文
“Each one of us is called to become / a Buddha / an Awakened One to give birth / to the realisation of the / interconnectedness of all things / and the compassion of seeking / to remove suffering from / one another” (Artist statement, ‘Theorama: Paintings on 9 Major Religions of the World’, India International Centre Quarterly, Vol. 22, No. 1, 1995, p. 94).
In many of his works, Maqbool Fida Husain has captured vital moments of Indian history and depicted them through people and symbols that encapsulate their importance. This skill to summarize larger histories in a concise and complete manner in his artwork seems to be a remnant of his time as a billboard artist in the beginning of this career. However, while his billboards advertised Bollywood films, Husain’s paintings often relay messages of identity, politics and in the case of the present lot, spirituality.
Husain was one of the founding members of the Progressive Artists’ Group, which was formed in Bombay just after India gained independence in 1947. The goal of recounting such histories and notable moments is to reclaim them and collect the ideals necessary for a newly independent India. There is a correlation between the desire for a secular political environment and the creation of artwork that can define an imagined sociopolitical future. Husain, like other members of the short-lived Progressive Artists’ Group, ventured to define such a future through his art.
In the present lot, Husain portrays the Buddha Shakyamuni along with three symbols of the Buddhist religion: the lotus, the Bodhi tree, and the dharma chakra. The central image of the Buddha is a composite form created through the convergence of figures shadowing him. The blue figure on the right holds the lotus, while the red figure gestures to the dharma chakra. The central Buddha holds a Bodhi plant in his lap, while his hands imitate the gestures of the forms behind him.
In Buddhism, the lotus, growing from roots in the mud to bloom on the water’s surface, symbolizes any being’s potential to escape from the murky realities of materialistic attachments and rise to enlightenment. The Bodhi tree represents the story of the Buddha’s own path to enlightenment. When he renounced his royal life, the Buddha cut his hair, exchanged his regal robes for simple coverings and surrendered the luxuries of the palace for the shelter of the Bodhi tree. It was under the heart-shaped leaves of this tree that he attained enlightenment. Interestingly, Husain has chosen to represent the tree as a potted plant in the Buddha’s lap, perhaps alluding to the long and isolated journey of spiritual growth and the many obstacles one faces on the path to enlightenment. The dharma chakra, or wheel of Dharma, represents the first sermon of the Buddha, in which he discussed the Four Truths, and also symbolizes the Eightfold Path of practices that leads to nirvana. Here Husain depicts it as a spiral form, possibly also signifying samsara, or the multiple rebirths one must experience before achieving nirvana.
The story of the Buddha’s renunciation and his quest for enlightenment is perhaps one that was also personal for Husain. During his time in school in Indore, Husain, the grandson of an Imam who raised him in Islamic tradition, forged a friendship with a devout Hindu, Mankeshwar, which lasted the next five decades. What kept the two connected over this time was their shared interest in religion and spirituality. Their discussions of spiritualism influenced Husain’s work greatly, as did Mankeshwar’s eventual decision to give up his materialistic existence and journey to the Himalayas to become a renunciant.
In the present lot, the three forms of the Buddha are faceless. In giving the Buddha this anonymity, which he grants many of his subjects, it is as if Husain creates a space for the viewer to see themselves in his seat, with the potential to attain enlightenment.
In many of his works, Maqbool Fida Husain has captured vital moments of Indian history and depicted them through people and symbols that encapsulate their importance. This skill to summarize larger histories in a concise and complete manner in his artwork seems to be a remnant of his time as a billboard artist in the beginning of this career. However, while his billboards advertised Bollywood films, Husain’s paintings often relay messages of identity, politics and in the case of the present lot, spirituality.
Husain was one of the founding members of the Progressive Artists’ Group, which was formed in Bombay just after India gained independence in 1947. The goal of recounting such histories and notable moments is to reclaim them and collect the ideals necessary for a newly independent India. There is a correlation between the desire for a secular political environment and the creation of artwork that can define an imagined sociopolitical future. Husain, like other members of the short-lived Progressive Artists’ Group, ventured to define such a future through his art.
In the present lot, Husain portrays the Buddha Shakyamuni along with three symbols of the Buddhist religion: the lotus, the Bodhi tree, and the dharma chakra. The central image of the Buddha is a composite form created through the convergence of figures shadowing him. The blue figure on the right holds the lotus, while the red figure gestures to the dharma chakra. The central Buddha holds a Bodhi plant in his lap, while his hands imitate the gestures of the forms behind him.
In Buddhism, the lotus, growing from roots in the mud to bloom on the water’s surface, symbolizes any being’s potential to escape from the murky realities of materialistic attachments and rise to enlightenment. The Bodhi tree represents the story of the Buddha’s own path to enlightenment. When he renounced his royal life, the Buddha cut his hair, exchanged his regal robes for simple coverings and surrendered the luxuries of the palace for the shelter of the Bodhi tree. It was under the heart-shaped leaves of this tree that he attained enlightenment. Interestingly, Husain has chosen to represent the tree as a potted plant in the Buddha’s lap, perhaps alluding to the long and isolated journey of spiritual growth and the many obstacles one faces on the path to enlightenment. The dharma chakra, or wheel of Dharma, represents the first sermon of the Buddha, in which he discussed the Four Truths, and also symbolizes the Eightfold Path of practices that leads to nirvana. Here Husain depicts it as a spiral form, possibly also signifying samsara, or the multiple rebirths one must experience before achieving nirvana.
The story of the Buddha’s renunciation and his quest for enlightenment is perhaps one that was also personal for Husain. During his time in school in Indore, Husain, the grandson of an Imam who raised him in Islamic tradition, forged a friendship with a devout Hindu, Mankeshwar, which lasted the next five decades. What kept the two connected over this time was their shared interest in religion and spirituality. Their discussions of spiritualism influenced Husain’s work greatly, as did Mankeshwar’s eventual decision to give up his materialistic existence and journey to the Himalayas to become a renunciant.
In the present lot, the three forms of the Buddha are faceless. In giving the Buddha this anonymity, which he grants many of his subjects, it is as if Husain creates a space for the viewer to see themselves in his seat, with the potential to attain enlightenment.