Important Notice

"As you grow, you realise the need to minimalise and weed out the unnecessary. Focus becomes all important." - MANJIT BAWA

The central figure in this classic Manjit Bawa painting, set against a flat, bright yellow background bears a strong resemblance to Krishna, frequently depicted as a flautist with blue skin. The figure may also be interpreted as Ranjha, from the tragic romance of Punjabi literature, Heer-Ranjha -... "As you grow, you realise the need to minimalise and weed out the unnecessary. Focus becomes all important." - MANJIT BAWA

The central figure in this classic Manjit Bawa painting, set against a flat, bright yellow background bears a strong resemblance to Krishna, frequently depicted as a flautist with blue skin. The figure may also be interpreted as Ranjha, from the tragic romance of Punjabi literature, Heer-Ranjha - Bawa has explained "Ranja [sic] is also a flute player, and Ranja was a divine lover... because Ranja gave everything for love." (Quoted in Marcella C Sirhandi, "Manipulating Cultural Idioms," Art Journal, New York: College Art Association, 1999, pp. 40 47)

Bawa was deeply influenced by Indian mythology, Pahari miniature paintings and Sufism, and his paintings often "...take shape around the single form or the compact group, without a trace of architecture to frame them. Each form, animal and human, rejoices in its plasticity... its gymnastic ability to defy the strictures of the anatomist. The rounded contours of each toylike figure speak of its prana, the life-breath that gives it a vital buoyancy, allowing it to occupy rather than be trapped in those flat, glowing, single-colour fields of red, yellow, green or blue that are Bawa's hallmark device." (Ranjit Hoskote, Manjit Bawa: Modern Miniatures, Recent Paintings, New York: Bose Pacia, 2000)

Bawa's subjects express simplicity not only in their forms, but in their interactions with the audience as well. In the present lot, the protagonist is lost in the act of playing the flute, yet softly meets the gaze of the viewer. The flute is a recurring motif in the artist's works - Bawa learnt to play the flute from maestro Pannalal Ghosh - and he often contemplated the ideal of a universal language, like music, through which all sentient beings could express and share their experiences of the world with each other.

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