Ravinder Reddy

Saffronart, 6-7 September 2006, lot 25

With vivid colours, lustrous gold surfaces and embellished adornments, Ravinder Reddy's iconic heads exude a tactile, sensual quality. His works draw on classical Indian sculptural prototypes whilst transforming them into a contemporary context. Reddy's heads combine the contemporary and the traditional, the secular and the religious, raising questions of social, sexual, religious and cultural identity.

Reddy worked to a variety of scales, and the current lot is larger than his smallest, more intimately scaled works. The woman's face, with her painted red lips, kohl-rimmed eyes and ornate, shining hair exudes a magnetic appeal, whilst her dispassionate gaze creates distance between her and the viewer.