Untitled

This is one of the first works Gaitonde created when he returned to painting in the mid-nineties following a break of several years. While the essential elements of his painting remain unchanged, this particular canvas appears to have a more defined structure. As Jaya Appaswamy describes, "The whole composition is more or less in one color in which the gentle gradations form a liquid matrix in which small and more solid outcrops of form appear and float. The style itself is reticent saying or suggesting only the least that needs to be stated. The colors too are limited and quiet and often consist of hues of the same color. The whole painting has a certain expansiveness because the composition is open and can be thought of as part of a larger reality..." (Jaya Appaswamy, 'The Paths of Abstraction', Lalit Kala Contemporary 19 & 20, April - September 1975, p. 6.)

It is the creative process that has always been of primary importance to Gaitonde. As Dnyaneshwar Nadkarni states, the medium is not separate from the content, rather "the motifs in these canvases literally surface in the pool of paint" (Dnyaneshwar Nadkarni, Gaitonde, New Delhi, 1983, p. 5.)