Akbar Padamsee

Biography:

Born in Mumbai, the illustrious artist Akbar Padamsee (April 12 1928 – January 6 2020) completed his Diploma in Painting from Sir J.J. School of Art, Mumbai, in 1951 before moving on to Stout State University, Wisconsin, after receiving J.D. Rockefeller III Fellowship in 1965. Padamsee is considered an intellectual artist influenced by various concepts, including formalism, an artistic practice that is regarded as integral to constructing the imagery.

Akbar Padamsee’s spirit of experimentation has allowed him to work with a myriad of media, including oil on canvas, graphite and charcoal drawings, acrylic and plastic emulsion, watercolour and Chinese ink, photography, metal and clay sculptures, printmaking, and films. His early portraits and landscape paintings in numerous mediums, such as painting, drawings, and etchings, demonstrate a semi-spiritual style. His oil-on-canvas works exude profound intensity and radiance.

Between 1959 and 1960, Akbar Padamsee’s colour palette changed tremendously as he abandoned rich colours and embraced grey tones. The time that followed when he restricted himself to monochromatic works is considered the Grey period.

Padamsee’s magnum opus, the rich landscapes or metascapes as he calls them, is his quest for stillness. Meta means beyond, and his landscapes transcend the traditions and look beyond the rules of reality. Metascapes are a distinct part of his vast oeuvre, often encompassing surreal cadmium and orange mountains against blue or brown backdrops. These series of works often radiate a calming effect, which is also hallucinatory.

Akbar Padamsee had an intense fascination for Sanskrit texts, which is reflected in his sun-moon metascapes, where he incorporates numerous elements of the universe. He combines elements such as water, earth, and sky in order to create a metaphysical landscape.

He has held various solo exhibitions, including Past Forward, Priyasri Art Gallery, Mumbai in 2013’; Sensitive Surfaces at Galerie Helene Lamarque Paris in 2008; Metascape to Humanscape at Aicon Gallery, New York and Palo Alto in 2007; and Photographs at the Guild Art Gallery in 2006. Padamsee has exhibited his works in various solos in the Pundole Art Gallery Mumbai from 1994 onwards. A solo show of his paintings was also organised at the Montreal Museum of Contemporary Art, Canada, in 1967.

Along with several group and solo shows held throughout his lengthy career, he had participated in Biennales, including the Venice in 1953 and 1955; Sao Paulo and Tokyo in 1959; Museum of Modern Art, Oxford in 1981; Royal Academy of Arts, London in 1982 and National des Arts Plastiques, Paris in 1985. In the year 1980, a retrospective of his work was organised at the Art Heritage Gallery in Mumbai and New Delhi in 1967.

Padamsee was awarded the Padma Bhushan by the Government of India in 2010. He was also the recipient of the Kailash Lalit Kala Award, New Delhi in 2010; the Dayawati Modi Award in 2007; Lalit Kala Ratna, Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi in 2004; the prestigious Kalidas Samman by the Madhya Pradesh Government 1997-98, etc. He also received the Jawaharlal Nehru Fellowship and made four short films in 1969-70.

Artworks By Akbar Padamsee