Syed Haider Raza (b. 1922)

Raza states, 'Music, poetry, dance, as much as literary thought, have always inspired me in my work.  But as a painter, I have to realise the ideas, the moods, the sentiments, in a visual language of form and colour.  A painting has to be seen, and to be felt.  It has to be felt – through all the senses.'  Geeti Sen, Bindu Space and Time in Raza’s Vision, p. 148 

In 1962 Raza was invited to the University of California to teach for the summer.  During this period he came into contact with the New York school of painters and he witnessed for the first time the Abstract Expressionism of such artists as Hans Hofmann, Rothko, Pollock and Sam Francis.  Pollock's works in particular had no geometric construction or spatial recession and this approach resulted in greater autonomy of the pictorial space which inspired Raza himself to experiment in new ways.  Raza's own move to a less structured composition coincides with a change of medium from oil to acrylic, which in itself allowed a greater freedom of application of the paint on the canvas.  

"Inevitably, freedom is accompanied by remembrance and for Raza this brought home the hot burning colours of miniatures from Mewar and Malwa, the searing sensations of his own land...There is no recognizable shape, only the fluency of colours - red, yellow and blue - emerge along with white and black to be assembled and reassembled simulating the passion and violence of the land."  Dalmia, The Making of Modern India Art; the Progressives, New Delhi, 2001, p. 155