Important Notice

"In 1947 India became independent and we were immensely happy. We wanted to take our destiny in our hands, not only as Indians. As painters. As thinkers. As people involved in 'artistic research'. There was very little of this 'research' in India....in the schools we were learning European art-painting and drawing from models, Greek and Roman, and following the European way of the 'world seen by the retina' or the eyes, as opposed to the concept... "In 1947 India became independent and we were immensely happy. We wanted to take our destiny in our hands, not only as Indians. As painters. As thinkers. As people involved in 'artistic research'. There was very little of this 'research' in India....in the schools we were learning European art-painting and drawing from models, Greek and Roman, and following the European way of the 'world seen by the retina' or the eyes, as opposed to the concept of antar jyoti or antar gyan, the third eye in India which was important to us" - S. H. Raza in an interview with Saffronart and Berkeley Square Gallery,2007

The essence of Sayed Haider Raza's art remains a quest to seek out beauty and represent nature through the inner eye he refers to. This became more developed in the late 1970s and the 1980s, when his understanding of colour, composition, geometry and structure, in relation to one another and with regards to their inherent properties, had matured. Earth is a creation that stems from this nuanced grasp of the formal aspects of painting along with symbolism and Hindu philosophy. More importantly, it addresses a dilemma that many of his contemporaries grappled with after independence: of seeking an idiom representative of a new India, while retaining a modern approach to art.

Raza is often called a colourist. Colour is the driving force in his paintings. In a career spanning nearly seven decades, he has dedicated fifty years to understanding the fundamental requirements of what makes a painting vital. His time in Paris in the 1950s, and the United States in the 1960s, were instrumental in directing and shaping his technique. At the Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts in Paris, he learnt how to structure a painting, and from his encounters with abstract expressionism while at the University of California, Berkeley, he segued to a more spontaneous phase. During these early phases, he attempted to master colour, conscious of each stroke and its placement. Yet it was only in the 1970s and 1980s, when he cast off the influence of the Ecole de Paris and turned to his roots, that his mastery over colour manifested in a majestic orchestration of hues, as seen in Earth.

During his arduous journey through the 70s and 80s, nature and his childhood memories in Madhya Pradesh remained integral to furthering his idiom. "From the 1970s I have been visiting Bhopal and Madhya Pradesh-to search for sources. There I discovered the poetry of Gajanan Muktibodh, I discovered poets like Ajneya, Nirala, Kedarnath Singh...I visited the Buddhist stupas at Sanchi, the primitive rock paintings at Bhim Betka, the streets of Indore and Gwalior. All these images revived and refreshed my memory. I personally feel, that as you go to different countries, you assimilate new ideas. All this is returned back to the sources which have been important to you from your childhood. Other elements, views, ideas, colour perceptions for instance, which are very strong in India-they come back to you with a new vitality. You are conscious of them. And as the work grows, as ideas grow, you incorporate these into your work." (The artist quoted in Geeti Sen, Bindu: Space and Time in Raza's Vision, Media Transasia Ltd., 1997, pg.83)

Raza's assimilations over the two decades are distilled in Earth: a masterpiece in terms of composition, style, and scale. The painting transcribes his meticulous studies in poetry, iconography, symbolism and philosophy onto a cohesive, visual plane. His earlier studies in structuring paintings have assumed a geometric rigidity in this work. They find shape in the lines that stretch along and cut across the canvas. The space is dissected into triangles and quadrilaterals, all radiating from the circle that is strategically placed in the centre.

The painting is limited to a colour palette of black, sienna, yellow ochre, red, brown, and green. It transcends the obvious, non-representational qualities of colour to draw from diverse sources. His use of specific colours to evoke the richness and sensations of the earth resonates with the use of colour in the 18th century Rasikapriya paintings of Mewar. The colour black holds immense meaning and potential for Raza. It is the "mother colour" from which all other hues are born; just as day emerges from the dark of night, colour and light emerge from blackness. His intensive use of black also taps into memories of night time in the densely forested village of Kakaiya, where he was born.

The upright and inverted triangles that fill the canvas call upon the symbolism of 'Tantra': a philosophy that extends back millennia and uses primal shapes to draw upon the energies that lie latent within the human body. The black circle-the 'bindu', which has been Raza's preoccupation since the mid-1980s-is the primordial seed from which all life springs forth and terminates. The circle began appearing early in Raza's works as a black sun, scorching over timeless, unidentifiable landscapes beneath it. Here, it has descended to occupy a central position as a 'bija', or seed, that is one with the landscape and contains unending possibilities.

Thematically, Earth revisits and probes into a continuing artistic concern. Raza has sought to depict the textures of his hometown and of India in previous stages, and with each, he shifts the discourse to address newly emerging queries. An earlier work, La Terre (1973), from his gestural phase, is more emotive and raw in its evocation of the earth. The brushstrokes are candidly spontaneous and reveal an unfettered force that thrums in the painting. Another similarly titled work, La Terre (1985), reflects the restrained maturity that his language developed into in the span of a decade, and bears the beginnings of his 'bindu' paintings. With Earth, Raza looks deep inward and, turning cartographer, details the sights, textures and hues that he knew so intimately into a map of the earth he has grown to know. It weaves everything into a denouement to all of his former concerns, while leaving open a possibility for uncharted inquiries.

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