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lot 12

lot 12

Sayed Haider Raza

Pommiers

oil on canvas
16 x 13 in. (40.6 x 33 cm.)
painted in 1960

Bought-In

Estimate: US$ 55,000 - 75,000

Lot Closed

Lot Details

Signed and dated 'Raza '60' (lower right)
Further signed, inscribed, and dated 'Raza / "Pommiers" / P_318 / '60 / 6F' (on the reverse)

PROVENANCE
Private collection, France
Cornette de Saint-Cyr / Lot 153 / Art Indien / Paris / 29 October 2010
Private collection, New Delhi
Saffronart / Lot 30 / Modern Indian Art / Winter Online Auction / 11-12 December 2013
Private collection, Dubai

PUBLISHED
Anne Macklin, S.H. Raza: Catalogue Raisonne (1958 - 1971), Vadehra Art Gallery & The Raza Foundation, New Delhi, 2016, pg. 58 (illustrated)

LOT ESSAY
Pommiers is a bold pattern of blues, greens, and reds, harmoniously merging into abstracted imagery of an apple orchard. As with S.H. Raza's other works during this period in his career, the expressionistic setting is not constructed from a literal depiction of the scenery or landscape. Instead, he manifested the essence of each pictorial elements in the canvas by capturing the mood and the ambiance to evoke an experience with nature rather than a direct image of it. Raza's vigorous application of paint and expressive brushwork gave the work a striking texture reminiscent of leaves or barks of an apple tree from an actual orchard.

"Notably the outlines of any cognizant forms have virtually disappeared - you may catch here or there a glimpse of a figure, the shimmer of leaves on a tree, or the vague marking of human habitation. But the mood which prevails, or to put it in his own term is, "a certain climate of experience." It is the brushstroke, which now assumes importance, to create this mood. The vibrancy of color becomes sensuous and the physical presence, and is applied with a boldness that defies the need for the subject matter - and for all else that mattered in painting." - Geeti Sen, Bindu: Space and Time in Raza's Vision, Media Transasia Ltd., 1997, pg. 76

Sayed Haider Raza

(1922 - 2016)
Born in 1922 in Babaria, Madhya Pradesh, Raza graduated from the Nagpur School of Art in 1943 and the Sir J.J. School of Art, Mumbai in 1947. He was one of the founding members of the Progressive Artists’ Group in 1948. After receiving a French Government Scholarship in 1950 he left for Ecole Nationale des Beaux Arts, Paris, where he was awarded the Prix de la Critique in 1956. In 1962 he served as a visiting lecturer at the University of California in Berkeley, USA. Raza has several solo exhibitions to his credit, including ‘Paysage: Select Works 1950s-1970s’, ‘Parikrama: Around Gandhi’, Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi, in 2014; ‘Shabd-Bindu’, Akar Prakar, Kolkata, in 2013; ‘Vistaar’, Art Musings and Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai, in 2012-13, ‘Bindu Vistaar’, Grosvenor Gallery, London, in 2012; ‘Punarangman’, Vadehra Art Gallery and Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi, in 2011; ‘Ones’ at Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi, in 2011 and 2010; Tao Art Gallery, Mumbai, 2008 and 2006; and Saffronart and Berkeley Square Gallery, London and New York, 2005. In 2007 Saffronart held a major retrospective of his work in New York. Raza’s work has been exhibited in several group exhibitions including those at Aicon Gallery, New York and London, in 2014, 13, 12, 11, 10; the Museum of Fine Art, Boston, in 2009; Grosvenor Gallery, London, Mumbai, 2004; Saffronart and Pundole Art Gallery, New York, 2001 and 2002; and Saffronart, Hong Kong and Los Angeles, 2001 among several others. Raza received a Lalit Kala Ratna from the Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi in 2004, and a Padma Bhushan and Padma Shri from the Government of India in 2007 and 1981 respectively. The Madhya Pradesh State Government also awarded him with the Kalidas Samman in 1996-97. Raza lived and worked in Paris and Gorbio, France, till 2011. The artist passed away in New Delhi in July 2016.