PRESS RELEASE*
Group Show
ASHTA NAYAK
ArtsIndia Gallery, NY
March 31 – April 29, 2005
Exclusive press viewing, March 24, 11am–7pm
Opening reception, March 31, 6-9 pm
Guest of Honor: M.F. Husain
Gallery ArtsIndia presents a landmark show featuring the eight founders of Modern Indian art. The first showing of this group together in over forty-five years, Ashta Nayak, or "Eight Founders," will open for an exclusive press viewing on Thursday, March 24th. Featuring thirty-five paintings, Ashta Nayak includes both recent and older works by internationally recognized artists who comprised the Progressive Artists Group of Mumbai: M.F. Husain, F.N. Souza, S.H. Raza, Ram Kumar, Tyeb Mehta, Akbar Padamsee, V. Gaitonde and J. Swaminathan. The show will open to the public on Thursday, March 31st, 6-9 pm. The artist M.F. Husain will be the honorary guest at the Opening.
The Progressive Artists Group formed on the eve of India's independence from Britain in 1947. Inspired by Western Expressionism and Fauvism, and opposed to the revivalist and ethnic trends in Indian art, the Progressives aimed to create a new national aesthetic for India within the framework of international modernism. The result was a spirited use of color, bold brushwork, and abstraction in Indian art, which contrasted the relative placidity and restraint of India's artistic past. Including new works and works from private collections, Ashta Nayak presents a comprehensive survey of how Indian art has evolved in the past 50 years by these 8 masters and juxtaposes the diversity amongst these artists.
M.F. Husain's work "Maya the Dream" (1972) captures the revolutionary spirit of the Progressive artists in both style and thought. The simplified, planar picture space, the abstract forms, and the strong lines in this work exemplify the influence predominant Western styles (such as Cubism and Fauvism) had on Indian artists in contrast with court miniatures of the past. The work also encapsulates a revolution in thought as Husain, brought up in a Muslim household and then residing in a predominantly Hindu India, depicts a well known scene from Buddhist folklore in which Queen Maha Maya dreams of greatness for her son, Buddha. Not afraid to overstep boundaries, Husain's revolutionary spirit perhaps served as inspiration for the Progressives as well as younger artists of the current generation.
Ashta Nayak also shows the wide range within individual artists' styles. For instance, J. Swaminathan's "Untitled - Bird Series" (1970s) exemplifies traits of his works from the 1960s and 1970s in which the artist strove to see "phenomena in their virginal state" as stipulated in the Progressives Manifesto of 1949. In this work, similar to many others, Swaminathan created an alternative pictorial space by dividing a conceptual landscape into bright color fields on which appeared mountains, stretches of water, trees, diagonally levitating stones, and an archetypal bird form. Simple yet captivating, his "Bird Series" paintings depict elements necessary for man's survival on earth while the bright colors convey an almost elevated sense. In "Untitled – Blue Abstract" (1993), Swaminathan breaks away from his earlier ordered, color-geometric, brush paintings to a more abstract drip form of painting in which he often applied pigments with his fingers.
With new works by Ram Kumar, S.H. Raza, Akbar Padamsee and masterpieces by F.N. Souza, V. Gaitonde and Tyeb Mehta, Ashta Nayak is a show to be seen by any individual interested in understanding the roots of Contemporary Indian art. The timing of the show could not be more appropriate. Coinciding with The Edge of Desire, a contemporary Indian art show co-presented by the Asia Society and the Queens Museum of Art, Ashta Nayak reveals the shoulders upon which the emerging artists of the former stand, and from where they trace their artistic heritage.
Please RSVP to Alka Singal, Gallery Director, at alka@artsindia.com.