AKBAR PADAMSEE (b. India 1928)

After the 1970's and early 1980's where the landscape dominated Padamsee's canvases, the mid-eighties saw the return of the figure to his works. While the reappearance of the figure makes these works distinct from his metascapes, there is a sense of continuity prevalent in his treatment of space and use of color. Despite the long gap, Padamsee's figures are surrounded with an aura of loneliness and vulnerability. As Eunice de Souza states, "most of the figures evoke a sense of vulnerability and anguish, yet none of them are simple victim figures, They are not merely alone, but essentially separate from the viewer. This separateness is so persistent a feature of the paintings that one is forced to ask whether it arises out of a sense of privacy of the self, or the uncompromising existential search in which each man or woman is irrevocably alone." (Eunice de Souza, Akbar Padamsee, Art Heritage, New Delhi.)