Important Notice

“Composition is the art of arranging in a decorative manner the diverse elements at the painter’s command to express his feelings.” – K H ARA

KH Ara made an astounding entry into the Indian art world in the 1940s, defying the difficult circumstances of his childhood, as well as the limitations from his lack of formal training in art. Born to a Dalit bus driver in a village in Andhra Pradesh, Ara ran away to Mumbai at the age of... “Composition is the art of arranging in a decorative manner the diverse elements at the painter’s command to express his feelings.” – K H ARA

KH Ara made an astounding entry into the Indian art world in the 1940s, defying the difficult circumstances of his childhood, as well as the limitations from his lack of formal training in art. Born to a Dalit bus driver in a village in Andhra Pradesh, Ara ran away to Mumbai at the age of seven, began working as a car cleaner, and eventually discovered he could paint. Using an apropos metaphor for the still life paintings that Ara eventually became famous for, critic Jagmohan compares the artist’s evolution as a painter to “a flowering plant that manages to shoot out from under the boulder to tantalize us with its colours. For in spite of the socio-economic burden of his people and his initial venture as a car cleaner, he emerged as a self-taught painter who had dazzled the eyes of innumerable people with his colourful, imaginative, expressionist paintings.” (Quoted in Yashodhara Dalmia, “The Stillness of Life: Krishnaji Howlaji Ara,” The Making of Modern Indian Art: The Progressives, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2001, p. 131)

While Ara would later dedicate his artistic career to painting his much celebrated still lifes and sensuous nudes, his early compositions were studies of everyday life in society. They “were based on human situations, which he turned into compositions much in the manner of textbook life studies. These were generic studies of fishing trawlers, men and women at wedding receptions and horse-riders, akin to the academic studies taught in art school and reminiscent of turn-of-the-century painters like Dhurandhar and Abalal Rahiman.” (Dalmia, p. 129)

The spirit of India’s independence movement, which Ara was involved in, also manifested in his works from the time. In the mid 1940s, “the country’s freedom struggle was gathering pace. Ara was increasingly drawn to it,... At this time he was still experimenting with academic realism, and some of his paintings of the period show him painting the surging multitudes in a cadence that was mesmeric.” (“Krishnaji Howlaji Ara, The still meaning of life,” Kishore Singh ed., Continuum: Progressive Artists’ Group, New Delhi: Delhi Art Gallery, 2011, pp. 200-202)

Many of these qualities are evident in the present lot, a vivid rendering of a parade ground. This oil on canvas shows a group of uniformed men on horseback in synchronised motion. Their audience sits towards one side, while a musical band can be seen performing on the other. This composition is not just reminiscent of the detailed and attentive manner in which Ara approached his studies, but also indicative of the life and vigour that were captured in his depictions of everyday human life.

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