Indian art: Meet the masters of popular aesthetics
These artists form the bulwark of the market and include well-known names with a consistent body and quality of work. To the public, they represent the face of Indian art without having to carry the burden of social engagement, thereby, believing in art for its own sake.
Curated By: Kishore Singh
The artist as satirist
FARHAD HUSSAIN (b. 1975)
Untitled
Acrylic on paper
12 x 9 inches
No one satirises our highly sexualised society like Farhad Hussain. A keen observer of social trends, Hussain mocks our pet peeves and fears. His paintings are often staged to resemble a farce of the kind that theatre often depicts. Hussain’s cast of characters revolves around the urban middle class, an influential, if inconsistent, constituency that is conservative as a group yet liberal in its individual capacity. He slowly constructs his scenes within the interiors of posh living rooms where the personalities of the protagonists are on open view. Using flat colour tones and an impossibly candy-coloured palette, he accentuates the play of emotions and physicalities, emphasising our response to situations in a farcical way. In these scenarios set within the umbrella of a family are the familiar and the shocking, the banal and the provocative.
In forcing us to think outside our comfort zone, he reinforces stereotypes. The wide-eyed, brightly painted ingénues of his paintings are part of the tapestry of our lives. Each figure in his paintings forms an integral part of the relationships he explores in the form of a tableau or a diorama, lives laid out in front of our eyes as if for dissection and to fuel the rumour mills that keep our social discourses lubricated.
FARHAD HUSSAIN (b. 1975)
Untitled
Acrylic on paper
12 x 9 inches
No one satirises our highly sexualised society like Farhad Hussain. A keen observer of social trends, Hussain mocks our pet peeves and fears. His paintings are often staged to resemble a farce of the kind that theatre often depicts. Hussain’s cast of characters revolves around the urban middle class, an influential, if inconsistent, constituency that is conservative as a group yet liberal in its individual capacity. He slowly constructs his scenes within the interiors of posh living rooms where the personalities of the protagonists are on open view. Using flat colour tones and an impossibly candy-coloured palette, he accentuates the play of emotions and physicalities, emphasising our response to situations in a farcical way. In these scenarios set within the umbrella of a family are the familiar and the shocking, the banal and the provocative.
In forcing us to think outside our comfort zone, he reinforces stereotypes. The wide-eyed, brightly painted ingénues of his paintings are part of the tapestry of our lives. Each figure in his paintings forms an integral part of the relationships he explores in the form of a tableau or a diorama, lives laid out in front of our eyes as if for dissection and to fuel the rumour mills that keep our social discourses lubricated.
