Bronze sculptures inspired by the repertoire of four of India’s celebrated artists — Thota Vaikuntam, Jogen Chowdhury, Krishen Khanna and the late Ram Kumar — are now on view at Hyderabad’s Kalakriti art gallery, after being showcased at the India Art Fair (IAF) 2020, New Delhi.
Twenty six sculptures exhibited at IAF as part of ‘Bronzed - From Paint to Patina’ project, act like a window into the iconic works of the four artists, in sculpture form.
The four artists are known for their distinctive styles. One needn’t be a connoisseur of art; even a casual observer of art in Hyderabad would be be able to identify the rural Telangana men and women as portrayed in Vaikuntam’s paintings. These two-dimensional paintings, when transformed into three-dimensional bronze sculptures, make observers of art to take a fresh look and reinterpret it.
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The sculptures are mostly in muted colours, minimalistic and occupy prominent spaces in the uncluttered gallery of Kalakriti, to enable visitors to observe the techniques of each of the artists in detail.
The late Ram Kumar who is regarded as one of India’s most reputed abstract painters had painted figurative works in the 1950s.
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Clay to bronze
The artist was enthusiastic about re-imagining some of this imagery as sculptures, decades later. His sculptures presented in this project were commissioned and approved by him.
His paintings were the first point of reference, after which artisans who collaborated with him made clay or wax models. These were worked upon further by Ram Kumar who supervised the corrections before the final sculptures took shape, in collaboration with UK’s sculpture casting foundry — Bronze Age London. The angular faces of the sculptures have a definitive sheen enabled by the superior smooth finish made possible by the casting process.
Thota Vaikuntam’s sculptures re-create the sari drapes and their fall with precision, immortalising the images of the rural women clad in vermilion red or mint-green saris.
From Krishen Khanna’s collection, the band series is in focus. Men who play as part of wedding music bands get a true-to-reality portrayal as they create music while at a ceremony, frozen in motion.
Cross-hatching
Jogen Chowdhury’s bronze sculptures were among the toughest to re-imagine from his paintings, according to the gallery, given the visual cross-hatching effect that was required. The process involved taking several printed images of his paintings, from different angles, to analyse the cross-hatching patterns and translate them to sculptures with the help of artisans. Clay models were created and worked upon, corrected and revised, before the patina process began.
The most challenging process of re-imagining paintings as sculptures was to match the original colour tones. Though the bronze patina colour palette tends to be different from paint colours, the process involved mixing different hues that reacted at high temperatures and ultimately would match the colours of the paintings.
(‘Bronzed - From Paint to Patina’ is on display at Kalakriti art gallery, Banjara Hills, Hyderabad, till March 8)