| Paritosh Sen |
|
A monumental life force invigorates Paritosh Sen's penetrating expressionist canvases, as the artist scrutinizes the vast panorama of human life in all its animated variety. His gaze may be critical, watchful or amused, but the cool overarching objectivity with which he creates his images, charges them with trenchant meaning. This is apparent even in his many self portraits, where he subjects himself to the same ironic appraisal - as if "probing deeply whether doubting the self is possible..."
Manasij Majumdar writes, "His keen interest in watching and getting to know people individually, or in a social milieu has had an important bearing on his art. This has kept ever alive, his interest in the figurative idiom and given him tremendous analytical confidence to treat human faces and forms in his paintings ... All the irony, wit and critical flavor that animate his images of human motifs come from his polished and chaste urbanity ... But he (also) knows the other side of existential reality, which, untamed by human culture, is ever active whether subliminally in human instinct, or in the world of nature ... pristine and elemental, dark and delightful, mysteriously elusive and plentifully manifest ... he celebrates the elemental force of life as expressed in the brute energy of animals in many of his canvases."
"What he gained abroad ... which had a densely impacted influence on his art, were his insights into forma! and figurative distortion and the structural complexities of Cubism, and the infinite potential of painterly surfaces and free form figuration that go with Expressionism."
Sen's humane art embodies his vision and his values, and radiates a wonderful sense of balance - an assured completeness of insight that images his deep experience of life, from the turbulent evolutionary years of pre- and post independence India right up to the ferment of current times; and of art movements and development from the late Bengal School period, over the creative resurgence of the '40's and his exposure to the vibrant School of Paris, to the gradual definition of artistic identity in contemporary India.
It is this "dense perception of life" that invests his work with both intellectual vitality and a profound sense of dignity.
|
About the Artist
1918 Born in Dacca , now Bangladesh
1936-40 Studied at Govt School of Art and Crafts, Madras
1950-53 Studied in Paris at Andre Lhote's School, Academy Grand Chaumier,
Ecole des Beaux Arts and at Ecole de Louvre (for History of Painting)
Solo Shows
1941 Uday Shankar Centre, Almora
1942 Literacy League, Lahore
1943 Town Hall, Indore
1944 YMCA Hall, New Delhi
1945 Maulana Azad College , Calcutta
1945 YMCA Hall, New Delhi
1947 AIFACS Hall, New Delhi
1948 Bombay Art Society, Bombay
1950 Ex Libris' Gallery, Brussels
1951 Private Home, Brussels
1956 Art & Industry, Calcutta
1960 Chemould Art Gallery , Calcutta
1967 Academy of Fine Arts , Calcutta
1969 Birla Academy , Calcutta
1972 Jehangir Art Gallery , Bombay
1973 Birla Academy , Calcutta
1974 Birla Academy , Calcutta
1981 Maryland Institute of Art, Baltimore
1982 Shridharani Art Gallery , New Delhi
1985 Chitrakoot Art Gallery , Calcutta
1987 Chitrakoot Art Gallery , Calcutta
1991 Cymroza Art Gallery , Bombay
1992 Village Art Gallery , New Delhi
1994 Galerie 88, Calcutta
1996 Galerie 88, Calcutta
1998 Birla Academy , Calcutta
1998 NGMA, Bombay
1998 Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi
1999 Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi
2001 Birla Academy , Calcutta
2001 Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi
2001 NGMA, Bombay
2002 Lalit Kala Kendra, Madras
Group Shows
1961 Joint show with Tyeb Mehta, London
1965 The Commonwealth Arts Festival, Sao Paulo Biennale, and Asahi Shimbun
Show of Art; Tokyo
1972 Four Indian Painters, Pittsburgh , U. S. A.
1986 Second Biennale , Cuba
He has participated in more than 100 important group shows in India and abroad.
Participations
1943 Founder member, Calcutta Group
1940-49 Taught art at Daly College , Indore
1955-56 Art teacher at Netarhat Vidyalaya, Ranchi
1956-79 Staff member, Regional Institute of Printing Technology, Jadavpur,
1962-63 Invited by French Government to design Bengali typeface based on
script of Rabindranath Tagore
1962 A documentary film on his work was made by West Bengal Government
1979 Invited by Indo-Soviet Friendship Association for exhibition of works at Moscow
1981-82 Visiting professor, Maryland Institute of Art, Baltimore, USA
Lectured on Contemporary Indian Art at various centers in the USA.
1983/84, 87 Artist in residence, National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad
(which published a portfolio of his short stories in English, illustrated by him)
Elected Fellow, Lalit Kala Akademi
1986 Commissioner, Indian section of Havana Biennale II, Cuba
Invited to speak on Indian Contemporary Painting at Loomis Chaffee School
by Allan Lundie Wise Lecture Fund, Windsor , Conn. , U. S. A.
Has been member of General Council, LKA, New Delhi;
Also member of Executive Council, Visva Bharati University, Santiniketan.
Has contributed numerous articles to journals on contemporary art.
Has published three books in Bengali.
Awards
1969-70 French fellowship to continue with designing typeface
1970-71 John D. Rockefeller III grant
1985 Asian Paints Award
1989 Abanindra Puraskar for painting by Government of West Bengal
1991 Doctor of Literature honoris causa by University of Burdwan , West Bengal
1999 Doctor of Literature honoris causa by Rabindra Bharati University , West Bengal
Received Hiralal Dugar Purashkar
2001 Awarded Kalidas Nag Medal
2002 The French Government conferred on him L'officier de l'ordre des arts et de letters, with a medallion
2004 Lalit Kala Akademi conferred the title of Lalit Kala Ratna with a gold medal
given by the President of India
|
