Lot 531: CHINTAN UPADHYAY

CHINTAN UPADHYAY
(Born in 1972)
NEW AVTAAR
signed, dated and inscribed 'Chintan March 2005 'New Avtaar' CHINTAN UPADHYAY UNLIMITED Acrylic & Oil on Canvas 10 ft. x 7 ft. Assist - Manish Sharma' in English
oil and acrylic on canvas
213.4 x 302.3 cm. (84 x 119 in.)
Painted in 2005

New Delhi, India, Lalit Kala Akademi/Vadehra Art Gallery, Are We Like This Only?, March, 2005.

NEW AVTAAR

Chintan Upadhyay melds Indian miniature techniques and iconography from his birthplace in Rajasthan with contemporary computer programming tools including Photoshop and Poser. Fascinated by the relationships created in juxtaposing disparate objects, Upadhyay explores the dualities of today's world through the examination of cloning and mass consumerism.

For Chintan, his paintings serve as units of cultural information, symbols of political memes, they look like cyberblitzs, kinds of cyber game objects, substance-less, disinvested of material inertia they represent the utilitarian de-spiritualized universe and open up the possibilities of new realms of reality. In this painting the infant with its third eye symbolizes spiritual knowledge and power like that of Lord Shiva. This eye of wisdom with its powerful gaze annihilates evil. The clenched fist of the infant, with the arms overhead adds movement and force to the composition and with Chintan's signature style and cast shadow, creates depth in an otherwise flat surface. His stylistic tendencies are as digital as they are painterly and he expertly uses them in this painting.

Explaining the use of traditional Indian imagery as a "second skin" of sorts, Upadhyay states "I remove the narrative context of the miniature and it becomes a skin or body suit. I rip elements of the miniature out of the original and create a mould. So originality, which is lost, is also being questioned." Playing with media, Upadhyay mixes disparate cultures and styles similar to the way a DJ fuses songs. "I'm trying to create a new way of understanding new media positions but it is short-sighted to see video and installation art as contemporary and to see painting as an older form." (Ananya Sen, "Clones might take god's place", DNA India, 13 January 2006).