MAQBOOL FIDA HUSAIN (1913-2011)

Many of Husain’s early paintings from the 1950s were defined by scenes of everyday rural life and depictions of village folk. From 1948 to 1955, Husain travelled extensively around the Indian countryside. His approach to line, form and colour evolved during this period. His palette became imbued with colours of rural India and his visual vocabulary inspired by images of peasants tilling land, farming with their animals, village women drawing water from wells and mothers with their children. His works also reflected a growing interest in Indian myth and cultural traditions. “His personal style assimilates the symbolic use of colour and spatial divisions of miniature painting, distinct stances from classical sculpture, and the simplifications and distortions from folk heritage.” (A. Jhaveri, A Guide to 101 Modern & Contemporary Indian Artists, Ahmedabad, 2005, p. 40)

With an expressive use of blues and greens in distinct planes of colour, Husain transforms a village girl in the present painting into the Hindu goddess Meenaxi, the one with ‘fish-shaped eyes’. Depicted in profile, she stands in an almost classical pose with her right hand raised in a mudra as if blessing the viewer.