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Lot 51

 

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"Everything starts from silence. The silence of the brush. The silence of the canvas. The silence of the painting knife. The painter starts by absorbing all these silences." - V S GAITONDE

In 1968, Gaitonde made a radical shift from his early horizontal canvases to a vertical format, which he retained through the rest of his career. After a series of watery, blue-green works painted between 1968 and 1969, Gaitonde explored the... "Everything starts from silence. The silence of the brush. The silence of the canvas. The silence of the painting knife. The painter starts by absorbing all these silences." - V S GAITONDE

In 1968, Gaitonde made a radical shift from his early horizontal canvases to a vertical format, which he retained through the rest of his career. After a series of watery, blue-green works painted between 1968 and 1969, Gaitonde explored the subdued, earthy colour palette seen in lot 51 in 1970. Speaking of a similar painting, Meera Menezes writes: "...there is an ineffable quality to the painting, a lyricism in the handling of colour and light. Emotion and sensation in this work are conveyed by a subtle and delicate use of paint. By using a roller, the paint is spread finely across the surface, creating an ephemeral effect. An economy of expression is conveyed by a restrained and austere use of colour with its muddy and mossy tints, while the consummate play of light and darkness creates a harmonious whole." (Menezes, p. 159)

Here, Gaitonde continues to draw from Chinese and Japanese calligraphy to create bands of floating, hieroglyphic objects or forms that punctuate the canvas. "These forms appear to float and seek anchor... If in some canvases, the shapes which cross the painting horizontally convey the appearance of a fence - often a barbed wire fence full of pointed spikes - it is, indeed, the evocation of an apt image." (Nadkarni, Gaitonde, 1983)

Gaitonde showed tremendous control over the canvas. From the application of colour to the manner in which the forms emerged, every element was deliberate and carefully thought out. "There is an evocative power in these paintings which operates on more than one level: there is a sense of atmosphere, there is an approximation of music and, what is most important, there is a throbbing mystery about the very process of viewing and responding as if one is sucked into some still centre of hitherto unknown experience." (Nadkarni, Gaitonde, 1983)

In 1972, Gaitonde received the prestigious Padma Shri award from the Government of India, and permanently moved to New Delhi. He began experimenting with newspaper and magazine cut-outs, using a lengthy process to perfect such works - he made a handful of paintings in a year, spending months working on a single canvas. "...the artist's masterful handling of color, structure, texture, and light, and his intuitive understanding of how these forces come together to alter one's perception are testament to his unwavering commitment to his craft." (Sandhini Poddar, V S Gaitonde: Painting as Process, Painting as Life, New York: The Solomon R Guggenheim Museum, 2014, p. 30)

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