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Saffronart | Evening Sale
PROPERTY FROM AN IMPORTANT PRIVATE COLLECTION
49
M F HUSAIN
(1913 ‒ 2011)
Dreams
Signed and dated ‘Husain 79’ (lower left)
1979
Acrylic on canvas
42.5 x 85.5 in (107.9 x 217.1 cm)
Rs 3,00,00,000 ‒ 5,00,00,000
$ 454,550 ‒ 757,580
PROVENANCE:
Grosvenor Gallery, London
Aquired from the above
PUBLISHED:
Balraj Khanna and Aziz Kurtha eds.,
Art of
Modern India
, London: Thames and Hudson,
1998, p. 75 (illustrated)
135
Dreams
offers a panoramic view into Husain’s
evolution as an artist. A large canvas, it is composed
of the classic images and symbols that have
featured often throughout Husain’s oeuvre. True
to its title, these disparate vignettes suggest a
surreal dreamscape. There is no order in this world
of animals, plants, silhouettes and faceless torsos,
rendered in Husain’s typical style.
At a broader level, the painting
is allegorical, alluding
to the complexities of themodernworld that Husain
often depicted in his art.
Dreams
encapsulates what
Shiv S Kapur describes as the essence of Husain’s art
in his 1972 book on the artist: “While his paintings
do have an immediate social context, the essential
concern of his art is archetypal: it explores the
parables of life, love and death. The figures in his