Vikash Kalra and M.F. Hussain
The painting on the right side is of M.F. Hussain. He painted the dream of Maya or Maya’s Dream as the title of the painting. Here, he is depicting either the birth of Lord Buddha or the dream of Maya in which she saw an elephant entering in her womb. Astrologist of her court predicted that the child will be either a great king or a great saint. Here, Maya is either holding a tree branch while giving birth to the Buddha or she was dreaming and a little shocked. The male figure is seems to be his husband Suddhodan. The painting is a mix of cubism and Indian traditional art.
While analyzing the left drawing we see two women figures, both are a little slender in shape lacking considerable feminine features. Both women are drawn in a cubic style. It is looking full moonlight due to the lack of shading and their comfortable body language with a kind of sex appeal. The round shape in the right corner seems to be the moon. On the other hand, it could also be a sunbathing scene with the same expression and sex appeal.
Vikash Kalra and F.N. Souza
The woman in Vikash’s artwork is having fluffy and unorganized hair with a small and weak neck while the right breast is slightly bigger than the left one. The stomach is curvy but not much bigger, the thigh is looking strong with lots of fat while hands are a little distorted but we can identify them as hands. The eyes and mouth are unnaturally open. It looks kind of horrific in nature. The shading for the curves is irregular and random. The belly button is inside while the stomach is not as curvy as the image on the right side.
The right side image was created by F.N. Souza where he used random structures to create a woman which we can recognize from the breast and vulva. While analyzing Souza’s drawing, we see a distorted face but organized hair. While the neck is having a necklace (a type of necklace we found in the Indian ancient sculptures). The shoulder is strong having some muscular features while the right breast is looking larger than the left one symbolizing the woman is slightly standing towards the right side while Kalra’s drawing is depicting a woman standing on the left with the almost same features.
The shading in the Souza painting is regular and helps in highlighting the body features. The breasts are pointy, outer stomach, and vulva are bigger as well as fatty thigh. The left side hand is resting on the thigh with folded fingers while in Vikash’s drawing the left side hand is openly resting on the thigh. While both drawings are depicting almost the same situation and posture of a woman there are considerable differences in their style of works. Vikash’s works are more random and unorganized than Souza’s.
Vikash Kalra and Jogen Chaudhary
In Jogen’s works, lines are dominant on the subjects. It seems like a complete figure is drawn with a single line. These kinds of works required rigorous practice and perfection in hand for creating such figures with the right amount of accuracy and precision. The nude in the upper right is drawn with a sense of randomness where the real provoking elements got diminished while a characteristic outline overshadowed the picture. While in the lower right, there are a lot more precision and careful lines. The lower image is somewhat more serious in tone than the upper right one.
While analyzing Vikash’s work on the left- we see random lines breaking frequently unlike Jogen’s works where lines are consistent. The upper left image is a very epitome and random version while the lower left is somewhat serious in tone but with breaking and random lines. Jogen is using subtle plotting and Vikash is working with the rub-off plotting. When we compare the bottom two pictures of both artists, Vikash’s work looks vivid while Jogen’s work looks feminine and resistible. The structures of the figures of both artists’ works are expressionist in nature.
Vikash Kalra and George Keyt
George was one of the most celebrated modern artists; his works combined European modernist innovations with South Asian fresco techniques. While we can clearly see the cubist principles in his works, we can’t actually disown the fact that he is boldly using local traditional techniques. The almond shapes eyes and conical figure of women with lots of curves remind us of the Indian artist Jamini Roy. While analyzing, we see some insecurity in the eyes of the nude figure although the women in yellow blouses look more confident and feminine.
While analyzing Vikash’s drawing which looks quite similar to the George painting, we can see both women are nude and both of them are looking confident and feminine. Although there is no cloth on them, the right side of the woman’s eyes is a little sarcastic while the left one is presenting herself with a larger head denoting more abundance. There is another quality worth a mention is the women’s drawings are a little conflicting with each other in Vikash’s artwork. The left woman is having a big face and a thin torso, the right one is having a small face with a big torso.
Vikash Kalra is a self-taught artist and writer based in New Delhi whose work has been exhibited across India and is held in several private and corporate collections.