The pastoral painter in his element
The sensibility of an artist and the sensuality of the pastoral has historical and political nuances. Take Jamini Roy for example, the ambassador of India’s simplicity in a simpler age. The 19th century artist Jean-François Millet’s peasant metaphors and contextual grammar influenced later masters like Van Gogh and Gaugin.
Rural imagery in Indian art is a given, considering the timelessness of the Indian idyll. Though late to recognition and celebrity status, Thota Vaikuntam is a reticent man. As if to escape the crowd of savants and journalists crowding Delhi’s Art Alive Gallery, the diminutive artist has retired behind a shut door. He is dressed in the tones of his palette— a taupe coloured vest and an mild amber coloured shirt.
Outside a crowd mills around a black and white painting of a mother and child. “It is one of my earlier works, which has hardly been shown.” Done in the early 1970s, it reflects his close relationship with his mother. It also begs the question whether Telangana itself is his Oedipal fountainhead. His women are resplendent in red, saffron, green with sideways glances that search beyond the frames in stillness, as if saying, “No, this is not all there is about us.”
Another famous artist from the same region, Laxma Goud, treats his subjects mostly with primal contrast and grey nuances, threaded with eroticism. Vaikuntam is more colourful although the work of both men with similar provincial upbringing is vastly dissimilar; except for the white moustache perhaps.
Author and curator Dr Alka Pande says, “Goud and Vaikuntam come from the same land and speak of a certain shared similarity, but visually they are different. While Vaikuntam’s women are reminiscent of what he sees around him. Goud’s works are more nuanced. There is a certain moving away, the works are not as passionate as Vaikuntam’s. The colours they use are also very different. While Vaikuntam’s colours are vibrant and in-your-face, Goud’s hues are subtle and more ‘muddied’.”
When Vaikuntam decided on art as a career, his family didn’t like it, admits the 82-year-old. His father ran a grocery shop in Burugupalli village in undivided Andhra Pradesh; art was an ‘unstable career’. “Thankfully my elder brother got a job. He put me through art school,” recalls Vaikuntam. After completing his studies he approached KG Subramanyan—Goud’s mentor, too. Subramanyan gave him studio space.
“I would paint and draw day in and day out with not a soul disturbing me. These were the formative years that helped me hone my art,” he says. But it was much later, when he went home village to nurse his ailing mother that he discovered his true muse: bucolic Telengana. He was drawn to the women particularly: bright bold colours and dark skin. His segmentalised stylisation of black, brown, ochre, and yellow bands blazing with a large red bindi on foreheads, and the flowing lines of saris looking like riverine tides became his trademark. “I was struck by the dark green sari border merging with the vermilion red blouse, and gold nosepins and bangles. Till date that fascination remains.”
In spite of his genius, and perhaps because of his reticence, Vaikuntham remained an ‘undiscovered’ artist, chosen only by connoisseurs. Until art curator Ina Puri showcased Vaikuntam’s art in Delhi. She says, “Very few people know of his early work. It veered towards abstraction. Another series bordered on eroticism. But his work kept evolving. Later Vaikuntam formed his own specific style—Telangana imagery that was accepted by collectors and gallerists as unique. As you age you stick to what works. He has done that.”
While his style has remained the same over the years, there have been subtle changes. Though Vaikuntamn’s love for primary colours is a constant in his oeuvre—he is dismissive of composite colours, which he believes are not natural—the recent work has tinges of gold and a certain sheen on the figures. The colours are a tad darker. Shades of pink make an entrance. When asked of his “repetitive” works, the diminutive artist says with childlike innocence, “Why should I look for a different muse? Didn’t Matisse paint in the same manner all his life?”
When & Where
Redefining the Cultural Gaze; Art Alive Gallery, Delhi; Till November 20