SH Raza’s career witnessed several phases of artistic progression. “This versatility,” says Sneha Gautam, VP of AstaGuru Auction House, “makes it an exciting process to curate his works. We try our best to source important pieces that encompass and represent the epoch of his various phases.” Here are five important works to celebrate his legacy.
Untitled (Street Scene), 1947: Raza started his career with idyllic landscapes deftly executed in water colour and depicting the Indian mainland. This was a formative phase of the artist’s career and this untitled work was executed in the same year he co-founded the Progressive Artists’ Group.
Paysage Corse, 1958: This work comes from the decade when Raza began the process of diluting tangible structure in his art. Post 1958, his works rarely involved the etching of a structure with architectural lineage.
La Provence Noire, 1965: Raza’s expressionist creation sprawls with black. The artwork has thick strokes of black while the suggested iridescent illumination is troughed with a sporadic application of white paint. The artist created this work just before he commenced the search for the source of Bindu.
La Terre, 1980: This work comes from the ‘La Terre’ series, which is symbolic of Raza’s long engagement with nature. It signifies the evolution of his vocabulary and is from a key transitional phase.
Sanshari, 1994: This work comes from the ‘Bindu’ series, for which he is most famous. “Bindu is a source of energy, a source of life. Life begins here, attains infinity here,” said the artist, about the iconic symbol that dominated his oeuvre for the last three decades of his life.
