From Pandharpur To The World

Mythological character of Ramayana, Lord Ram was banished into exile for 14 years. As Vishnu, he returned to earth time and again. He came also in the form of Lord Vithoba in Pandharpur on the banks of the Bhima river. Since then, the ancient town became a holy pilgrimage site for the faithful. Ram’s exile is just one of the legendary tales that a small Sulemani boy called Maqbool heard when he went with a friend to see Ramlila in his village. Maqbool was fond of listening to the exploits of Lord Ram, little knowing that Ram’s exile would have some meaning for him in the future. When Maqbool was growing up, the self-taught artist drew his own inspired version of Hindu Gods and Goddesses on paper. It is this propensity to paint Hindu deities in his own style that would come back to haunt him later in his life and lead to his exile from India.

Husain has been painting gods and goddesses for decades, in the process evolving an art form unique to him. His expression of the female form is inimitable. Husain has become a legend and has effortlessly traversed from the 20^th and 21^st century. He has lived in exile from 2006 to 2009 in UAE till he was offered and accepted the citizenship of Qatar. The journey from small pilgrim town of Pandharpur to Doha, the capital of Qatar in the Persian Gulf is a cheered one. In between M. F. Husain lived in Indore, Delhi, Ahmedabad and Mumbai for a major part of his life as an artist.

“I am an original Indian painter and will remain so till my last breath.”

Maqbool Fida Husain, the name conjures a plethora of ideas and stories in the minds of people who are aware of his legendary status. A master painter, a colourful person, a filmmaker with a difference, a lover of the most expensive cars on earth, a painter who prefers to walk barefoot.

Long considered a pioneer of Modern Indian art, Husain initially made a living as a billboard painter and children’s furniture designer, painting at first in his spare time until joining the Bombay Progressive Art Group (PAG) in 1947. Since his beginnings in the 1940s, Husain sought to radically redefine and redirect the course of Indian painting, paving the way for modern Indian art’s now recognized presence on the international stage. His odyssey to find the most immediately communicative elements of painting drew him to the residual remains of Cubism, earning him an invitation in 1971 to exhibit alongside Pablo Picasso. Thus, a rising star by the early 1970s, Husain reached a level international prestige unparallel by any other Indian artist of his time. Husain himself became a legend in his lifetime – an imposingly tall, bearded, and perpetually barefoot man with a shock of white hair, often brandishing an oversized paintbrush – who elevated himself from the ordinary man to a distinctive icon.

Husain painted his country with the eye of a man who knew his subject uncomfortably well; he knew India’s insecurities, blemishes and inner turmoil. Beyond the controversy that eventually led him into exile, he was above all an artist radically and permanently redefining Indian art, while remaining unafraid to confront the growing social and political issues of his country’s transformations. Between 1990 and 2006, his paintings increasingly stirred resentment from Hindu Nationalist Groups, who campaigned against Husain’s religious paintings of the 1970s. By 2007, charged with hundreds of suits citing indecent portrayals of Hind deities, Husain’s past obscenities warranted his arrest. Husain lived in self-imposed exile from 2006 until his death in 2011.

Bharatmata by M. F. Husain

Husain, both the artist and the iconoclast, was known for his boldness, he never shied away from expressions of critiques of modern India, which helped lay the foundations for the pervading themes of Modern and Contemporary Indian art to this day. The artist consistently explored the blending of folk, religious, political and mythological subject matter to create unprecedentedly unique, vibrant and sometimes controversial works. His endless quest for his cultural roots and willingness to absorb diverse influences from both the Eastern and Western art historical canons made M. F. Husain arguably the most prolific and recognizable figure of Modern Indian art, and an artist long overdue for a serious revaluation on an international scale.

“…. My journey is still on. What is important to me is continuity…”