Lot 26: BIREN DE (INDIA, 1926-2011) Golden Trail

BIREN DE (INDIA, 1926-2011)
Golden Trail
Signed and dated 61 lower left
Oil on canvas
122 x 76cm (48 1/16 x 29 15/16in).

Provenance
From the collection of the artist
Born in Faridpur, Bengal – in what is now Bangladesh, Biren De
travelled to Kolkata where he attended the Government College of
Arts and Craft. Like many of his counterparts, Biren De’s early works
were figural and impressionist in style. Biren De became a well
regarded portrait artist, his works reminiscent of Augustus John.
He captured an essence of the subject through masterful chiaroscuro
and tonal impasto.
In the 1950s Biren De developed a distinct form of cubist realism,
pastoral figures were drawn with rudimentary lines and colours.
In 1951 he exhibited at the Salon De Mai, Paris, and in 1959, he was
awarded the prestigious Fulbright Scholarship which took him to the
United States. Biren De is most noted for his ‘neo tantric’ style works
of the late 1960s onwards. It was a label he distanced himself from,
preferring the moniker ‘Symbolic-abstract expressionism’ to describe
his style.
“My paintings, I believe, are organic examples of the total me; of
what I am and what I would like to be: a continuous striving and
therefore, a struggle, to put the shattered pieces together and make
a composite whole. My guideline is oscillation between two points:
between the peace of graveyard and the peace of the centre of the
sun. Either way there is no END, no finality.”
(The Flamed Mosaic – Indian Contemporary Painting, Neville Tulli
p. 294)
This is a rare example of Biren De’s most formative works. A piece
directly from the late artist’s personal collection which has not been
seen publicly since it was executed in 1961.
“My paintings, I believe,
are organic examples
of the total me; of what
I am and what I would
like to be: a continuous
striving and therefore,
a struggle, to put
the shattered pieces
together and make a
composite whole.”