Akbar Padamsee, Indian Modernist Painter, Dies at 92

Akbar Padamsee, a key figure in Indian modernism, died in 2020 after a seven-decade career. His artistic journey began in Mumbai, where he was born in 1928 and studied at the Sir J.J. School of Art. Inspired by Hindu iconography from childhood and later by Fauvism and Georges Rouault, he moved to Paris in the 1950s. Padamsee is renowned for vibrant paintings featuring heads, torsos, and nudes, often integrating Sanskrit texts, Chinese writings, and Paul Klee's diagrams. In 1959, he entered a 'grey period,' creating monochrome semi-abstract landscapes exhibited at Mumbai's Jehangir Art Gallery in 1960. A 1965 Rockefeller fellowship took him to New York, followed by a residency at the University of Wisconsin-Stout. Returning to India in 1967, he received the Nehru Fellowship in 1969 and founded the Vision Exchange Workshop, producing the video animation SYGYZY from his geometric drawings. Though not a member of the Progressive Artists' Group, he shared their rejection of orientalism and nostalgic nationalism. His work appeared in solo and group shows globally, including at the Centre National des Arts Plastiques in Paris, the National Gallery of Modern Art in New Delhi, the Museum of Modern Art in Oxford, and the Royal Academy of Arts in London, as well as at the São Paulo, Tokyo, and Venice Biennales.