Important Notice

Ram Kumar visited Ladakh twice, in 1976 and 1993, each time painting a series of works afterward inspired by the colours of the stark mountains and arid landscape, as seen in the present lot. The artist says, "The landscape haunted me for quite some time. Later when I tried to paint my impressions on canvas, I could not imagine any colors. Th e eternal silence of a wasted, barren earth which refused to compromise with man could not be visualized... Ram Kumar visited Ladakh twice, in 1976 and 1993, each time painting a series of works afterward inspired by the colours of the stark mountains and arid landscape, as seen in the present lot. The artist says, "The landscape haunted me for quite some time. Later when I tried to paint my impressions on canvas, I could not imagine any colors. Th e eternal silence of a wasted, barren earth which refused to compromise with man could not be visualized in any other colors except grey and black and white." (Artist quoted in Uma Prakash, Ram Kumar: Selected Works 1950-2010, New Delhi: Vadehra Art Gallery, 2010, p. 9)

The artist is well-known for painting abstract-sometimes desolate, yet meditative-landscapes inspired by his travels around the world. The present lot, painted in 1980 following his first visit to the Leh district in Ladakh, is part of his long spiritual journey that began with Benares in the sixties. "It was a lifelong eff ort to find some harmony between a rich, throbbing 'spiritually-visited' nature and the secret, fleeting thoughts of an artist." (Artist quoted in Prakash, p. 13)

"As I began to paint, the landscapes came naturally and gradually, the outlines faded into abstracts... There is an enigmatic mystery about the inner life of a colour applied on canvas. It stands out by itself in the beginning but slowly it starts building up relationships with other areas, other colours, and forms. This continues. There is a pause, a silence, an accident and in the end some sort of harmony." - RAM KUMAR

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