Important Notice

Rameshwar Broota creates intensely emotional works that comment on our humanity, which he fears we are losing sight of through the process of living in a highly technological and industrialised world. Ella Datta examines the present lot, Blast in Silence, stating that, "The painting of an enlarged, exquisitely shaped ear counterposed with an unrelenting concrete form crystallises a subtle dialogue between man-made form and a natural one.... Rameshwar Broota creates intensely emotional works that comment on our humanity, which he fears we are losing sight of through the process of living in a highly technological and industrialised world. Ella Datta examines the present lot, Blast in Silence, stating that, "The painting of an enlarged, exquisitely shaped ear counterposed with an unrelenting concrete form crystallises a subtle dialogue between man-made form and a natural one. The way he evokes the intrinsic characters of the two different forms is a wonderful experience. On the one hand, there is the complex auricular form with its supple skin and delicate, curvilinear bone structure and on the other, there is the severe, rigid, phallic, form symbolising an incipient aggression." (Ella Datta, Rameshwar Broota, New Delhi: Vadehra Art Gallery, 2005, p. 9)

"The formidable presence of 'man' that once loomed large on Broota's monumental canvases has now been fragmented and mutated in the wake of mindless urbanization and mechanization...Now man is threatened by his own creations. His staying in power and resilience is pitched against the omnipotence of his metallic counterparts." (Roobina Karode, Counterparts: Recent Paintings by Rameshwar Broota, New Delhi: Vadehra Art Gallery, 2009, p. 5). Broota's work creates a discourse on the paradox of man, who is powerful yet exceedingly vulnerable, and is continuously in search of his place in the universe. The dark colours add to the sense of despair that Broota seeks to evoke.

The textured treatment of the canvas adds to the aura of objects as disembodied from their contexts. Broota accomplishes tonalities and depth by laying paint on the canvas with multiple thin layers before scratching it away with a knife. "By 1978 the sharp geometrically defined spaces and massive figures evaporated under the insistent scraping and nicking of the blade. On the brink of a definitive phase in his career, Broota realised the figure need not be imposed on the canvas. It could as well be coaxed, revealed or evacuated from its depths." (Karode, p. 29) Over the years, Broota has developed and mastered the hand movement and rhythm needed to create these paintings with precision. Datta compares Broota's technique of scratching away at the paint to a form of meditation, in which the artist loses himself to the process.

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