Bhupen khakhar biography of donald
•
Tate Modern, London, until 6 November 2016
Review by Trevor Grundy*
DURING his relatively short life (1934-2003), the Bombay-born narrative artist Bhupen Khakhar – whose paintings appear before the British public for the third time since 1982 at Tate Modern’s retrospective exhibition entitled You Can’t Please All – was no stranger to controversy or the sound of clashing verbal swords.
He’s known throughout Asia as the sub-continent’s first “pop” artist.
India’s first openly gay painter would be a better description of this courageous and unflinchingly honest man who has attracted such praise – balanced by a hefty amount of scorn – in recent years.
A review in the leftwards-leaning The Guardian (May 31), by art critic Jonathan Jones, asked: “Why is Tate Modern exhibiting an old-fashioned, second-rate artist whose art recalls the kind of British painters it would never let through its doors? Why are we supposed to be interested in this old-fashioned, second-rate artist whose paintings are stuck in a time-warp of 1980s neo-figurative cliché?”
He went on: “The only reason to give Khakhar a soft ride would surely be some misplaced notion that non-European art needs to be looked at with speci
•
Bhupen Khakhar: the gentle radical painter
An observer and painter of life, a chartered accountant occasionally picked up his paintbrush to reflect the uncanny, the fantastical, the mixed droll, and dramatic impulses quintessential to everyday life. Bhupen Khakhar (b.1934) unabashedly revealed the melancholia, mundanities, and inner monologues of the marginal man. Khakhar was born in Bombay, but the quaint town of Baroda nurtured the artist in him. An office accountant in the city of dreams, money was not the only thing Bhupen wished to draw.
In 1962, Khakhar left his lucrative job as a chartered accountant in Bombay and went to the university town of Baroda to explore his interest in art. Here, he joined the Art criticism course at the Faculty of Fine Arts while working as an accountant to sustain himself.
"I think art is just like everyday life. It is full of frivolity, it has its seriousness; for me, it is a necessity, like when I eat." [1]
A home away from home, Bhupen fearlessly exercised his artistic liberties in Baroda. "I came to Baroda because it would have been impossible for me to stay in Bombay and paint because my family members would not allow me. I wanted complete freedom," said Bhupen in one of his interviews. Initially, Bhupen wo
•
Selected Solo Exhibitions
Selected Group Exhibitions
Bhupen Khakhar was entail Indian Inhabitant Modern & Contemporary organizer who was born bolster 1934.