Akbar Padamsee | |
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| Born | (1928-04-12)12 April 1928 Bombay, Maharashtra, India |
| Died | 6 January 2020(2020-01-06) (aged 91) Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India |
| Alma mater | Sir J.J. School of Art |
| Occupation | Painter |
| Children | Raisa Padamsee |
| Website | akbarpadamsee |
Akbar Padamsee (12 April 1928 – 6 January 2020) was an Indian artist and painter, considered one of the pioneers inmodern Indian painting along withS.H. Raza,F.N. Souza andM.F. Husain.[1] Over the years he also worked with various mediums from oil painting, plastic emulsion, water colour, sculpture, printmaking, tocomputer graphics, and photography. In addition, he worked as a film maker, sculptor, photographer, engraver, and lithographer.[2] Today his paintings are among the most valued by modern Indian artists. His paintingReclining Nude was sold for US$1,426,500 atSotheby's in New York on 25 March 2011.[1][3]
He was awarded theLalit Kala Akademi Fellowship (Lalit Kala Ratna) by theLalit Kala Akademi, India's National Academy of Arts, in 2004,[4] theKalidas Samman from theMadhya Pradesh Government in 1997 forPlastic Arts and thePadma Bhushan, India's third highest civilian honour in 2010.[5]
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Padamsee was born into a traditionalKhoja Muslim family hailing from theKutch region ofGujarat.[2] Their ancestors had belonged to theCāraṇa caste of court poets and historians. The family had been settled in the nearbyKathiawar region for some generations; Padamsee's grandfather, who had been thesarpanch (headman) of Vāghnagar, a village inBhavnagar district, had earned the honorific name "Padamsee" (a corruption of "Padmashree") after he distributed his entire granary to the village during a famine. His original family name was "Charanyas", due to their ancestors beingCharanas or court poets.[1][2]
Padamsee's father, Hassan Padamsee, was an affluent businessman who owned 10 buildings and also ran a glassware and furniture business. His mother, Jenabhai Padamsee, was a home-maker. Akbar Padamsee was one of their eight children; one of his brothers is the actorAlyque Padamsee. Although rich, the family was not well-educated, and neither of his parents had received much education. Alyque and his brothers (but not his sisters) were the first to attend school and learn English there; the parents later picked up a smattering of the language from their sons.[6]
Early in life, he started copying images fromThe Illustrated Weekly of India magazine in his father's accounts books at their store on Chakla Street, inSouth Mumbai.[1] He studied atSt. Xavier's High School, Fort, and it was here that met his first mentor, his teacher Shirsat, awatercolourist. He first learned this medium, followed by classes on nudes atCharni Road in preparation for his studies at theSir J.J. School of Art. As a result, he was allowed to join the course directly in its third year. He was still studying fine art at the school, when theProgressive Artists' Group (PAG) was formed in 1947 byFrancis Newton Souza,S. H. Raza, andM. F. Husain. The group was to have a lasting impact on Indian art. By the time he received his diploma he was already associated with the group.[2]
Akbar married Solange Gounelle, in Paris in 1954. The couple had one daughter,Raisa Padamsee.
Akbar moved to India in 1968 and lived and worked in Mumbai with his wife Bhanumati Padamsee[7]
He had a number of siblings, but the most notable of them isAlyque Padamsee, who was a celebrated theatre personality & advertising mogul who headed theLintas Bombay Ad agency.
In the last years of his life, Padamsee and his wife Bhanu are reported to have moved into theIsha Yoga Center, Coimbatore permanently, after having visited the centre a few times several years ago.[8]
In late 1950, Raza was awarded a French government scholarship, and he invited Padamsee to accompany him to Paris. Padamsee left for Paris in 1951, where artistKrishna Reddy introduced him to thesurrealistStanley Hayter, who became his next mentor. Padmasee soon joined his studio, "Atelier 17". His first exhibition was held in Paris in 1952. The artists exhibited anonymously, thus he shared the prize awarded by the French magazineJournal d'Arte with the painterJean Carzou.[1]
His very first solo show was held at theJehangir Art Gallery in 1954, and soon he became one of leading artists. He received theLalit Kala Akademi Fellowship in 1962, a fellowship by theRockefeller Foundation in 1965 and was subsequently invited to be anartist-in-residence by theUniversity of Wisconsin–Stout. He returned to India in 1967.[2]
As a member of many artistic committees, he took part in the development of the collections of theBharat Bhawan museum ofBhopal, and created the VIEW (Vision Exchange Workshop). He curated major cultural events and received many distinctions such as the Padma Shri in 2009.
His work is introspective; his "Metascapes" or his "Mirror Images" are abstract images formed from the search for a formal logic. His topics include landscapes, nudes, heads and he has done portraits created in pencil and charcoal. The depth which emerges from his oil-based works, emanates from the coloured matter. This creates a pictorial technique juxtaposing emerging split forms.
He has done, in addition to his painted work, black and white photographs which use light to create dimension. Padamsee always explored new plastic genres; he also explored computers in "Compugraphics".
He lived in South Mumbai with his wife Bhanumati, and worked at his studio inPrabhadevi. He died on 6 January 2020 at the age of 91.[9]
Between 1969 and 1970, Akbar Padamsee, one of the pioneers of Modern Indian painting, made a rare16mmexperimental film titledSyzygy.[10] This was a silentanimation film made up solely of lines and dots and the connections between them. This film was made using a code oralgorithm and can now be seen as an early example ofgenerative art. The wordsyzygy is often used to describe interesting configurations of astronomical objects in general. With its attempt at pure form, it is also a precursor tocomputer art ordigital art, despite being entirely hand-made.[10]
In 2015, filmmakerAshim Ahluwalia discovered that Padamsee had made a second film that had fallen into obscurity.Titled Events In A Cloud Chamber, was shot on a 16mmBolex camera. The film ran for six minutes and featured a single image of a dreamlike terrain. Inspired by one of Padamsee's own oil paintings, he had experimented with a new technique of superimposing shapes formed with stencils and acarousel slide projector. The abstract electronic soundtrack was composed in 1969 byGeeta Sarabhai, thereby qualifying her as the first female electronic musician in India.[11]
After just a handful of screenings in 1970, the film was shipped to an art expo inNew Delhi where it was misplaced. The reversal print is now lost and no copies exist.[11]
Between 2015 and 2016, Ashim Ahluwalia worked with Padamsee, who was then almost 89 years old, to try and remake the lost film from memory. The filmmaker managed to track down the original tapes of Sarabhai’s score but they had been demagnetized. Ahluwalia’s 2016 film, also calledEvents In A Cloud Chamber as a result of their collaboration and premiered at theVenice Film Festival followed by screenings atThe Museum of Modern Art and other venues, renewing interest in Padamsee’s neglected film work.[11]
Syzygy has recently had a revival screening at theCamden Arts Centre in an exhibition titled “Zigzag Afterlives: film experiments from the 1960s and 1970s in India” by curatorNancy Adajania. It was included in the exhibition “Mud Muses” at theModerna Museet inStockholm.[12]
I was born into riches: Ours was a Kutchi business family. My father, Jafferseth, owned 10 buildings and also ran a glassware and furniture business. My mother, Kulsumbai Padamsee, was a housewife. Anything I wanted was there for the asking. We were eight children in all but I, being born after three daughters, was pampered most. Among Gujarati families, it was only the Padamsees and the royal house of Rajpipla. At school, I learnt to speak in English. Later, our parents learnt the language from us. All that I am today is because of what I learnt at school. Miss Murphy, who ran the school, was an inspirational figure for me.
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