Important Notice

Born in 1933, Himmat Shah initially trained as a draughtsman in Vadodara. Also studying painting, and then etching at Atelier 17 in Paris, it was only later in his career that Shah turned to sculpture. Interestingly, Shah was born in Lothal, an Indus Valley civilization excavation site, and one of the highest yielding in terms of sculptural artifacts.

A founder member of the short lived artists’ collective, Group 1890, Shah was... Born in 1933, Himmat Shah initially trained as a draughtsman in Vadodara. Also studying painting, and then etching at Atelier 17 in Paris, it was only later in his career that Shah turned to sculpture. Interestingly, Shah was born in Lothal, an Indus Valley civilization excavation site, and one of the highest yielding in terms of sculptural artifacts.

A founder member of the short lived artists’ collective, Group 1890, Shah was interested in changing the direction of modern Indian art such that it turned away from the ‘domination’ of Western styles and subjects, and acknowledged indigenous folk and tribal sources instead. In his monumental bronzes, like the present lot, we can see some remnants of the group’s strongly worded manifesto.

Here, the figure is pared down to an essential or primal state, displaying the precedence of form over narrative, a characteristic common to several Indian schools of folk art. Experimenting with materiality and texture, this piece challenges formal notions of representation and reality. Like Shah’s other sculptures, this elongated bronze head sweeps aside conventional notions and standards of beauty to reveal the truth that lies behind them. In showing his viewers ‘real’ beauty, the artist pushes them to question art and existence as they know and experience them.

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