Two Banks of a Sacred River: S.H. Raza’s Life in Art
A lecture by Ashok Vajpeyi
poet, writer, and Chair of the Lalit Kala Akademi,
India’s national academy of fine arts

Free Admission and open to the public
No RSVP required

Syed Haider Raza is widely recognized as one of the undisputed masters of modern Indian art. Living in Paris for many years, he has combined in his art the French ‘sens plastique’ and a deeply rooted Indian vision. From painting landscapes and cityscapes, he has moved to explore inscapes–realities seen by the inner eyes. His art fuses sensuous colours with luminous spiritual grace. Raza returned to India in 2010, at the age of 89, after spending 60 years in France. An important member of the Progressive artists group which blazed new trails for modernism in Indian art, different from the dominant Bengal School of the 1940s, Raza became part of the Parisian art scene in the 1950s. In the 1970s, a process of self-questioning rejuvenated his Indian roots, giving rise to the iconic “Bindu” which combines energy and vision. Raza’s childhood memories of tribal forests in central India and particularly of the Narmada river came back to him and his canvas in full force, transformed into abstract images by a master colorist. Since then, Raza has been exploring the spiritual and the sensuous, including a vision of the origin of nature as a coming together of male and female energy. The talk by poet Ashok Vajpeyi, one of Raza’s closest friends, will trace a fascinating artistic career.