Some Famous Paintings of the Modern Indian Art

Indian artists have crafted some remarkable artworks that have enchanted the world. Given below are the most famous Indian paintings of all time.

The Lives of Mediaeval Saints

Benode Behari Mukherjee was a member of the first batch of students in Santiniketan’s Kala Bhavan. He produced many incredible paintings, including “The Lives of Medieval Saints,” a mural at Shantiniketan’s Hindi Bhavan. A blend of a unique understanding of his talents and an intuitive, clear direction set him distinct from many of his peers. The mural uses the buon fresco technique and spans nearly 23 metres across the top section of the room’s three sides.

The Lives of Mediaeval Saints was portrayed in a modern setting, with even the most basic lines used to design each figure. Benode Behari Mukherjee was born with poor eyesight in his left eye and therefore had limited access to traditional education. Despite this, he achieved fame and success as an artist. He was also among the first artists in modern India to recognise the value of a painting as public art.

Benode Behari Mukherjee brilliantly portrays the syncretic and compassionate Indian life tradition seen in the writings of great Bhakti poet-saints such as Ramanuja, Kabir, Tulsidas, Surdas and others. The mural resembles a painted woven tapestry in certain aspects, a vocation that many of these saints practised.

Haldi Grinder

Amrita Sher-Gil was a well-known Indian artist. She painted numerous paintings, but “Haldi Grinder” showcases her incredible artistic talent. She painted this piece in 1940. She was looking for inspiration in India’s idyllic rural scene at the time. Such a scenario, which showed Indian ladies engaged in the customary practice of grinding dried turmeric, had to be portrayed in the Indian style.

She painted “Haldi Grinder” using vibrant, vivid hues. With her European experience in modern art, she quickly drew parallels between north Indian miniature crafts and Paul Gaugin’s current work. The people and trees are flat patterns painted on the canvas. As a modern artist, she was interested in creating depth in the scene and embraced a semi-abstract design. Amrita Sher-Gil’s “Haldi Grinder” depicts frail yet dominating ordinary females with depths, a strong sense of pride and massive control over their livelihood.

Indeed, Amrita’s feminist viewpoint and unique persona are portrayed in her artworks of womanhood. This painting technique reminds us of Basohli paintings from north India.

Mother Teresa

1. F. Husain’s portrait of Mother Teresa dates to the 1980s. It is done in the artist’s signature style, which he moulded into a new language of contemporary Indian art. The faceless Mother appears draped in the blue-bordered white saree, cradling a baby and focusing her gaze on her hand.

A grown man is horizontally placed on the lap of the central image of the seated Mother. M. F. Husain demonstrates the artist’s knowledge of European art, particularly Michelangelo’s Pieta, a famous sculpture by the Italian Renaissance master. The scene is portrayed using current platforms. They have the impression of a collage of paper cut-outs

  2.F. Husain does not try to portray Mother Teresa’s life realistically, and to make sense of the plot, his hints must be followed. The woman’s kneeling figure on one edge symbolises the feeding of the needy. He beautifully highlighted portraits of starving children and dying men and women, who were the ultimate beneficiaries of Mother Teresa’s kindness and compassion.

In due course, his image of Mother Teresa became more than just an artistic portrait and took on the qualities of a biography. Undeniably, M. F. Husain has had a significant impact on modern art in India.

Whirlpool

Krishna Reddy, India’s famous artist, created his iconic painting, “Whirlpool,” in 1963. It is a fascinating artwork that employs different blue shades. Each hue weaves into the next to form a solid graphic web – the outcome of a new printing process he designed with a well-known printmaker, Stanley William Hayter, at the legendary Atelier 17 studio. Bright shades are poured to the same metal workpiece in a technique known as ‘viscosity printing.’

In the painting, each colour is blended with variable amounts of linseed oil to avoid colours pouring into each other. The print’s subject matter, concerned with water movement, perfectly embodies the technique predicated on knowing how water and oil interact.

Children

Somnath Hore (1921–2006) painted this graphic print on canvas in 1958 using monochrome etching with acrylic paint. His earliest sketches and paintings covered portraits of men, women, children, and pets and location and life paintings of tragic famine survivors, suffering and dying villagers and beggars. However, these line drawings were hardly used because they resembled realistic shapes and tonal techniques.

Images of children were used in this engraving to memorialise the 1943 famine, which was vividly seared in his heart. As the characters whisper to themselves, there is no foreground, viewpoint or surrounding scenario in this close-knit piece with five standing people. These youngsters depict the most vulnerable portion of society.

Somnath Hore’s other artworks are Peasant Farmers’ Meeting, Wounded Animal, Mourners, the Unclad Beggar Family, The Child and Mother with Child. Fairy Tales from Purvapalli

1. G. Subramanyan painted this artwork in 1986 using water and oil colours on adhesive paper. The title references his location in Purvapalli, a Shantiniketan neighbourhood where his idea seems to wander all over the universe. His imaginary landscape portrays a fascinating world where people live with birds and animals.

Some trees grow feathers instead of leaflets. Colours are poured in hasty brush strokes in this sketchy painting style. The colour palette is rustic, with ochres, greens and browns. Figures are placed atop one another instead of behind each other, as in classic miniature paintings, producing a flat space, a hallmark of modern art.

Conclusion

Indian painters have created some extraordinary works of art that have captivated viewers all around the globe. In the above paragraphs, we looked into some of the marvellous paintings of the mediaeval saints such as Krishna Reddy, M.F. Hussain, and so on.