Lot 18
Maqbool Fida Husain (India, 1915-2011) Untitled (Self Portrait)
11 June 2015, 14:30 BST
London, New Bond StreetSold for £56,250 inc. premium
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Maqbool Fida Husain (India, 1915-2011)
Untitled (Self Portrait)
Untitled (Self Portrait)
Oil on canvas
Signed in Devanagari lower right
106 x 56cm (41 3/4 x 22 1/16in).
Signed in Devanagari lower right
106 x 56cm (41 3/4 x 22 1/16in).
Footnotes
Provenance:
Acquired by John Guyer, while stationed in India, Afghanistan and Sri Lanka 1950s-1970s. Guyer joined the Peace Corps in India, and was country director of the program in Afghanistan. Later he started and was director of the Asia Foundation project in Sri Lanka.
Kumar Gallery, Sundanagar, New Delhi, in 1973
Thence by descent
Husain was a founding member of the Bombay Progressive Artists' Group in 1947. Its inception, only months after the partition, was against the backdrop of a socially fractured landscape. Husain, along with Raza, Souza, Ara, Gade and Bakre, sought to create a new movement in Art from India, distancing themselves from the nationalist rhetoric of the Bengal School. Hailing from different faiths and castes, they strove to create a style, and with it, an outlook, that was distinctly Indian and Modern.
"Through the Eyes of a Painter", Husain's first film, was awarded a Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival in 1967. In the 1970s, when Husain is likely to have painted this piece, Indian art was becoming increasingly prominent on the international stage. In 1971 Husain and Pablo Picasso were the only artists to be specially invited to the 11th Sao Paulo Bienalle.
The Indo-Pakistan war, which contributed to the formation of Bangladesh, reignited the question of identity. In this work, a hand in the centre of the torso gestures the peaceful kapithaka mudra and Husain himself stands broad shouldered partially enclosed by a rectangular outline of what may be a mirror. This self-portrait, never before seen at auction, is a serene and personal insight into the artist.