Nasreen Mohamedi

Nasreen Mohamedi’s works were radically different from those of her contemporaries. Most of her fellow Indian artists were preoccupied with figuration and the bold use of color. Meanwhile, Mohamedi explored monochromatic abstraction and geometry, through both her photography and her delicately rendered drawings on paper.

The current work from 1962 powerfully illustrates the hallmarks of Mohamedi’s 1960s drawing practice, as described by Roobina Karode: 

‘Though her works from the 1960s seem to be within the lineage of lyrical abstraction, they are the most agitated works in her entire oeuvre. A certain messiness comes through, of nature withered, abandoned, bearing only traces of the ‘beatings’ of life… Ink wash and dry brush are adequate to create the rising agitating ripples in another drawing, the tip of the brush trembling as it leaves a mark to bleed on the moist paper. Colors begin to fade and disappear, and a monochromatic intensity takes over.’

(R. Karode, ‘Waiting is a Part of Intense Living’, Nasreen Mohamedi: Waiting Is a Part of Intense Living, edited by R. Karode et al, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, 2015, p. 27)