Vasudeo S. Gaitonde (India, 1924-2001)

Composition No. 1

Footnotes

Provenance:
Morris Graves 1963-68, acquired directly from the artist in Bombay
Humboldt Arts Council, San Francisco, 24 October 1968

Published:
Sandhini Poddar, V.S. Gaitonde: Painting As Process, Painting As Life, Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York, 2014, p. 29, fig. 19


Gaitonde completed his studies at the J. J. School of art in 1950, three years after independence, a time of heavy nationalist rhetoric throughout society, particularly the arts. Gaitonde's early pieces show remnants of influence from Indian miniature painting. In the early 1950s, however, he makes a marked shift from representational to abstract. Noted for his denial as an abstract artist, preferring the term 'non representational', Gaitonde's work goes beyond mere abstraction versus realism. His brush and roller strokes do not depict in the conventional sense, they instead are catalogue of strokes as part of a personal narrative.

Prabhakar Kolte noted that Gaitonde '...followed a rule: painting equals life. He considered it the means as well as the end, the journey as well as the destination. And he was psychologically, intellectually and physically prepared for this odyssey... He became engrossed in trying to develop the visual aspect of silence. As a result, silence transformed onto the canvas spontaneously as a visual script.' (Prabhakar Kolte, 'Husain and Gaitonde', From Art to Art – Essays and Critique, Bodhana Arts Foundation, Mumbai, 2008, p. 82)
Impacted by the teachings of Zen Buddhism, in these six works the formal purity of line expresses the meditative quality of Gaitonde. Lots 29, 30 and 31 show the use of paint rollers and ink, and the series marks the commencement of the shift from horizontal format works to vertical.
'...Gaitonde would stress the place of the spectator, and his or her own experience of the work, over any inherent directive or objective to his painting.' (Sandhini Poddar, V.S. Gaitonde: Painting as Process, Painting as Life, Guggenheim, 2014, p. 21).
All six lots are referenced in the Guggenheim publication Sandhini Poddar's V.S. Gaitonde: Painting as Process, Painting as Life, Guggenheim, 2014.