Artist Sudhir Patwardhan's new collection depicts family drama

The reason of change in 61-year-old artist Sudhir Patwardhan’s work was the birth of his grandson, where he comes out with his new collection called Family. Many works in the show are images of interiors and people at home. They are family narratives.

Says Patwardhan, “As a grandparent one begins to think differently about one’s own complex experiences of having been a father and a son. This thinking directly or indirectly, has influenced the current body of my work.”

Like in his Gray Chamber (painting), there is a room with one window. On a table there are piles of dead bodies and above that on the ceiling, there is an erotic image of a piles of female bodies
inspired by Austrian painter Gustav Klimt. The piles of dead bodies depict suppression, guilt and anger that every human being faces. The female bodies depict violence and jealousy.

The painting, Gray Chamber, depicts the number of rape cases and serial murders occurring nowadays as well as the suppression of guilt and frustration in those who commit such a crime.

The artist explains, “Full Circle is connected with the emotion of guilt. In it a sick man is sleeping on a cot while the family waits for sickness to be over, through death or through a return to normalcy. The waiting wears away pretence and exposes the true wishes of these members. Sickness and death are an integral part of every family,” he adds.

In Nostalgia, he has complied three different scenarios into one. There is a man sitting in room, a picture of his wife and mother standing in the gallery and from the adjoining room one sees an urban landscape, which stretches up to the mountains. This painting is titled, ‘Nostalgia’ because it defines urbanisation.
He adds, “I thought of this painting when I came across a picture of my wife and mother. It depicts, how urbanisation has brought about a rapid change and how, one can, no longer admire the beauty of nature, as one could do in olden days. Thus it is nostalgic.”