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Tyeb Mehta
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Born in Kapadvanj, a town in Gujarat in 1925, Tyeb Mehta believed, "In art you have to go on for a long time before you can say 'I have done something.'" Initially a film editor, his interest in painting led him to the Sir J.J. School of Art, Mumbai from where he graduated in 1952. Between 1959 and 1964 he lived and worked in London. He also visited the US on a Rockefeller Fund Scholarship in 1968.
Like most other artists of the...
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Born in Kapadvanj, a town in Gujarat in 1925, Tyeb Mehta believed, "In art you have to go on for a long time before you can say 'I have done something.'" Initially a film editor, his interest in painting led him to the Sir J.J. School of Art, Mumbai from where he graduated in 1952. Between 1959 and 1964 he lived and worked in London. He also visited the US on a Rockefeller Fund Scholarship in 1968.
Like most other artists of the Progressive Artists Movement in India, Mehta could trace his influence to the European masters. His inspiration came from the macabre distortion used by artist Francis Bacon, which can be seen even in the handling of the face and the body of his most recent works, before his death in 2009. Of his early works, Mehta had this to say: "When you are young, you try to understand the world. As you grow old, you try to understand yourself. Your work then becomes the essence of these efforts."
While he was also known to have adopted the pictorial language of European art through the 1950s and 60s, Mehta turned to 'Indian' themes and subjects through the 70s and 80s. This return to Indianness had been a characteristic of most of his contemporaries. S.H. Raza returned time and again to the Tantric Bindu and Akbar Padamsee came back home to study Sanskrit and Hindu philosophy, a study that inspired his monochromatic metascapes. From painting images of rickshaw-wallahs and the trussed bull, Mehta had narrowed down his search for the eternal in the complex, layered images and concepts of Hindu mythology. Through the 90s his imagination was captured by the myth of the Devi (Goddess) - as Durga, Kali, Mahishasura Mardini, the slayer of the demon Mahishasura (the different incarnations of the goddess).
Mehta's use of the flat planes of color to conjure space and the diagonal division of it were both devices that existed in the Indian miniature tradition and were his additions to the Baconian style of the macabre. About his own growth as an artist, Mehta said, "An artist comes to terms with certain images. He arrives at certain conventions by a process of reduction."
He used the ancient Indian technique of creating multiple images to convey motion. This is obvious in the many arms of the Nataraja (the dancing God), which represent the movement of the hands in the Bharatanatyam dance form. Tyeb blended this with the radical vision he acquired in his days as a member of the Bombay Progressive Artists Group, using this ancient Indian treatment of motion to reflect the continuing decline in the price of a man's work in the face of the rising prices of other commodities. He used ancient images in a modern sense, blending the demon Mahishasura into the butcher's buffalo. Critics often laud his technical excellence that makes such complex meanings also clear.
Having trained as a film editor and made one experimental film, Koodal (1970), Mehta applied the "freeze frame" technique from that medium to arrest the anarchy of movement in his canvases. He used violence not as a disturbance but as a resolution. Consequently, his paintings, even if they are turbulent, eventually leave a calming influence. "For me, Kali is an extremely benevolent goddess," said Mehta. "She's not destructive, she kills asuras (demons)."
His work is characterized by matt surfaces, diagonal lines breaking his canvases, and images of anguish - a result of his preoccupation with formalist means of expression.
Apart from several solo exhibitions Mehta had participated in international shows like Ten Contemporary Indian Painters at Trenton in the U.S. in 1965; Deuxieme Biennial Internationale de Menton, 1974; Festival Internationale de la Peinture, Cagnes-Sur-Mer, France 1974; Modem Indian Paintings at Hirschhom Museum, Washington 1982, and Seven Indian Painters at Gallerie Le Monde de U art, Paris 1994. He was awarded the Kalidas Samman by the Madhya Pradesh Government in 1988.
Tyeb Mehta passed away on 2nd July, 2009.
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Born
1925
Died
2009
Education
1947- 52 Diploma in Painting, Sir J. J School of Arts, Mumbai
Exhibitions
Selected Posthomus Exhibitions
2014 'Sacred / Scared', Latitude...
Selected Posthomus Exhibitions
2014 'Sacred / Scared', Latitude 28 Gallery, New Delhi2013 'Pioneers of Modernism', Sovereign FZE, Dubai 2013 'Ideas of the Sublime', presented by Vadehra Art Gallery at Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi2012 'Modernist Art from India: Approaching Abstraction', Rubin Museum of Art, New York
2012 'Extending the Line', Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi2012 'Crossings: Time Unfolded, Part 2', Kiran Nadar Museum of Art (KNMA), New Delhi 2011-12 'Modernist Art from India: The Body Unbound', Rubin Museum of Art, New York 2011 'Ethos V: Indian Art Through the Lens of History (1900 to 1980), Indigo Blue Art, Singapore2011 ‘Manifestations VI', Delhi Art Gallery, New Delhi2011 'Roots in the Air, Branches Below: Modern & Contemporary Art from India', San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose 2011 'Tyeb Mehta: Triumph of Vision', Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi 2011 'Time Unfolded', Kiran Nadar Museum of Art (KNMA), New Delhi2010 'The Progressives & Associates', Grosvenor Gallery, London 2010 'Evolve: 10th Anniversary Show', Tao Art Gallery, Mumbai 2010 'Masters of Maharashtra', collection from Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi at Piramal Gallery, National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA), Mumbai 2009 'Bharat Ratna! Jewels of Modern Indian Art', Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Selected Solo Exhibitions
1998 Vadhera Art Gallery, New Delhi 1996 ‘Celebrations’, Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi 1990 Birla Academy of Fine Arts, Kolkata 1990 Art Heritage, New Delhi 1988 Bharat Bhavan, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh 1986 Gallery Chemould, Mumbai 1986 Nandan, Kala Bhavan, Vishwa-Bharati, Santiniketan 1976 Black Partridge Art Gallery, New Delhi 1969, 71 Kunika-Chemould Gallery, New Delhi 1968 Commonwealth Institute Art Gallery, London 1966 Taj Art Gallery, Mumbai 1966, 67 Kumar Gallery, New Delhi 1956,68,71,76,84,86,90 Gallery Chemould, Mumbai 1962 Bear Lane Gallery, Oxford 1962 Gallery One, London 1959 Gallery 59, Mumbai
Selected Group Exhibitions
2009 'Long Gone & Living Now', Gallerie Mirchandani + Steinreucke, Mumbai 2009 'Progressive to Altermodern: 62 Years of Indian Modern Art', Grosvenor Gallery, London 2009 'Kalpana: Figurative Art in India', presented by The Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) at Aicon Gallery, London; The Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) 2008 'Multiple Modernities: India, 1905-2005', Philadelphia Museum of Art, USA 2008 ‘Freedom 2008 – Sixty Years of Indian Independence’, Centre for International Modern Art (CIMA), Kolkata 2007-08 ‘India Art Now: Between Continuity and Transformation’, Province of Milan, Milan, Italy 2004 ‘Concept and Form’, Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi 2001 ‘Ashtha Nayak – an Exhibition of Eight Artists’, Tao Art Gallery, Mumbai 2001 ‘Century City – Art and Culture in the Modern Metropolis’, Tate Modern, London 2001 ‘Modern Indian Art’, organized by SaffronArt and Pundole Art Gallery, Metropolitan Pavilion, New York 2000 ‘A Global View : Indian Artists at Home in the World’, organized by The Fine Art Resource, Mumbai at Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai 1998 ‘Contemporary Indian Art’, organized by Vadehra Art Gallery at Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai 1997 ‘Tryst with Destiny : Art From Modern India’, Singapore Art Museum, Singapore 1997 ’50 Years of Art in Bombay 1947-1997’, National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA), Mumbai 1997 ‘Indian Contemporary Art: Post Independence’, organized by Vadehra Art Gallery, National gallery of Modern Art (NGMA), Mumbai 1996 ‘Chamatkara: Myth and Magic in Indian Art’, Whitley Art Gallery, London 1994 ‘Seven Indian Painters’, organized by Gallery Le Monde de l’ Art, Paris 1993 ‘Trends and Images’, Centre of International Modern art, (CIMA) Kolkata 1993 ‘Wounds’, organized by Centre of International Modern art, (CIMA) Kolkata at New Delhi 1989 ‘Timeless Art’, organized by The Times of India together with the auction conducted by Sotheby’s, London 1988 ’17 Indian Painters’, Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai 1987 Auction conducted by Christies’ of London for Helpage, India 1987 Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad 1987 ‘Artists Today East West Encounters’, organized by Max Mueller Bhavan, Mumbai at Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai 1986 ‘Coups-de-Coeur: Exhibition of Indian Paintings’, Geneva 1985 ‘Contemporary Indian Painters’, Festival of India in USA, Grey Art Gallery, New York 1982 ‘Contemporary Indian Art’, Festival of Indian Art, Royal Academy of Arts, London 1982 ‘India: Myth and Reality’, Museum of Modern Art (MOMA), Oxford 1982 ‘Modern Indian Paintings’, organized by National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA), New Delhi, at Hirshhorn Museum, Washington DC, USA 1981 Inaugural Exhibition, Roopankar, Bhopal 1979 ‘Focus, Four Painters Directions’, Gallery Chemould. Mumbai 1977 ‘Pictorial Space’, Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi 1965 ‘Ten Contemporary Indian Painters’, MIT and New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, USA 1965 ‘Art Now in India’, London, Newcastle and Ghent 1960, 62 London Group Show 1960 ‘Art Alive’, Northampton Museum
Participations
2009 'Armory Show', New York presented by Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi 2008-09 'Modern India', organized by Institut Valencià d'Art Modern (IVAM) and Casa Asia, in collaboration with the Ministry of Culture at Valencia, Spain 2008-09 ‘Expanding Horizons: Contemporary Indian Art’, Traveling Exhibition presented by Bodhi Art at Ravinder Natya Mandir, P.L.Despande Kala Academy Art Gallery, Mumbai;Sant Dyaneshwar Natya Sankul Art Gallery, Amravati; Platinum Jubilee Hall, Nagpur;Tapadia Natya Mandir Sports Hall, Aurangabad; Hirachand Nemchand Vachanalay’s, Solapur;Acharya Vidyanand Sanskrutik Bhavan, Kolhapur; PGSR Sabhagriha, SNDT, Pune; Sarvajanik Vachanalaya Hall, Nasik2008 'Moderns', Royal Cultural Centre, Amman, Jordan organized by Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi in collaboration with Embassy of India, Amman,Jordan 1982 Fifth Triennale, India 1975 Third Triennale, India 1974 Festival Internationale de la Peinture, Cagnes-Sur-Mer, France 1974 Deuxieme Biennale Internationale de Menton 1968 First Triennale , India 1965 National Exhibition, New Delhi
Honours and Awards
2004 Awarded Gold Medal by the President on the occasion of Lalit Kala...
2004 Awarded Gold Medal by the President on the occasion of Lalit Kala Akademi Golden Jubilee Celebration, Delhi 2004 ‘Manpatra’, given by Maharashtra Government, Mumbai 1988 Awarded ‘Kalidas Sanman’, Bharat Bhavan, Bhopal 1970 Wrote and directed ‘Koodal’, a sixteen minute experimental film for Films Division, Government of India which made him won the ‘ Film fare Critics Award’ 1968-69 Rockefeller IIIrd Fund Fellowship, New York
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PAST AUCTIONS
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Lot 41
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Summer Online Auction
26-27 June 2024
Untitled
Pencil on paper
13.75 x 10 in
Winning bid
$26,024
Rs 21,60,000
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Lot 20
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Spring Live Auction
13 March 2024
Trussed Bull
Charcoal on paper
10.5 x 14.5 in
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$61,463
Rs 50,40,000
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Lot 91
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Winter Online Auction
13-14 December 2023
Untitled
Pencil on paper
9.5 x 7 in
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$20,241
Rs 16,80,000
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Lot 20
Details
Winter Live Auction
13 December 2023
Head (Study for...
Ink on paper
14.5 x 10.5 in
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$43,373
Rs 36,00,000
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