The forgotten legend
In the age of contemporary, conceptual and new media art, portraiture has its own class too
Not every artist can create a picture- perfect portrait. It is an art mastered by a select few. Leonardo Da Vinci spent innumerable days to perfect the Mona Lisa.
This also begets the questions, why artists today eschew portraiture as an art form? Has contemporary and new media art taken over the classic form of portraiture and is it no more appreciated as a classic art form? Partially, yes. Yet, portraiture as an art form can’t be substituted by conceptual and new media art.
In Indian art, one of the most revered portrait artists remains the legendary Raja Ravi Varma. Another noted artist is Amrita Sher- Gil, whose pitch perfect portraits of Indian ladies are considered to be the best. Sher- Gil was famous for her nudes. Particularly famous is her series of rural Indian women.
Legends like F. N. Souza, who painted mindboggling portraits in their own styles, and unsung heroes like M. V. Dhurandhar and G. S. Shenoy are others of repute. The late John Fernandes was also a famous and cult portrait artist and is rated by many as one of the finest exponents of portraiture in India.
Mumbai serves as a hub of a host of yesteryear portrait artists and even today a lot of emphasis is laid on portraiture in art institutions.
From the younger lot, one of the first names that comes to mind is Elayaraja, the artist from Chennai whose portraits of local rural women are creating ripples. Does he believe that portraiture is losing popularity? Elayaraja says, “Many people consider portraiture as an art form which is nothing but copy work from photos and it is more used these days for commissioned work. There are rarely artists who are into portraiture full- time. Some noted ones are Antony Das, Sanjay Bhattacharya, etc. Even when I interact with artists abroad, there is a rarity of ‘ talented’ portrait artists there. ”
Understandably, the fascination of the artists and art collectors these days is towards contemporary, conceptual and new media art.
In Indian art, one of the most revered portrait artists remains the legendary Raja Ravi Varma
HARISH KUMAR S., artist and curator
With all due respect, these new forms of art have their own creative ways but portraiture is irreplaceable regardless of what the art market has to say.
Some notable artists whose portraits are wellreceived include Prafulla Sawant, Amit Bhar, Pramod Kurlekar, Ramesh Terdal and Sujata Sah Sejekan.