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Lot 10

 

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“A large part of Khanna’s paintings emerge from the recesses of memory, often appearing like serial contemplations on the same subject.” One of the several images that recur in Krishen Khanna’s oeuvre through the years, the figure of the scribe harks back to the artist’s past, but also shares several qualities with his other iconic subjects.

“Like the bandwallah or the card player, the scribe is usually depicted as a solitary figure.... “A large part of Khanna’s paintings emerge from the recesses of memory, often appearing like serial contemplations on the same subject.” One of the several images that recur in Krishen Khanna’s oeuvre through the years, the figure of the scribe harks back to the artist’s past, but also shares several qualities with his other iconic subjects.

“Like the bandwallah or the card player, the scribe is usually depicted as a solitary figure. Crouched on his haunches behind a takht, an Indian style desk, pouring over his manuscript or book of accounts, he brings an air of intimacy to bear…The agitation of expressionist impasto brushstrokes impacted with paint, the roiling noisy scenes of the bandwallahs, the rumble of the trucks and the clatter of the street dhaba fades. The scribe is not a visionary like the risen Christ at Emmaus or the dying patriarch Bhishma, but testimony to a life lived in quiet perseverance. The figure was inspired by Khanna’s grandfather, a man of whom he had only heard some stories, who lived in the latter half of the 19th century, and of whom there are no photographs. The details themselves are quite sketchy, of a writer with a good hand, who had worked as a munshi or a clerk. The only existing remnant of the scribe is a fragment of court petitions inscribed in Urdu, testimony to the kind of work he did everyday. As a visitant from the past the scribe often appears as if in nebulous detail. Sitting in profile at his takht, with a stylus in hand, he appears to listen intently, or write as his patron speaks, an oft-painted figure in sepia tones, on the edge of definition…In his apparent patience and attitude of a certain resignation, the scribe allies with the fruit sellers, the quiescent sleeping bandwallahs or labourers in his oeuvre, which when seen together point to the resilience, if not the heroism, of the ordinary” (Gayatri Sinha, Krishen Khanna: The Embrace of Love, Mapin Publishing Pvt. Ltd., Ahmedabad, 2005, p. 37).

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