Lot 272: Dhruva Mistry (b. 1957)

Tree Spirit 2, 1988-90
Signed and dated in ink
Bronze, 5 in an edition of 5
24 1/2 x 68.5 x 8 1/2 in. (62 x 27 x 21.7 cm)

London, Nigel Greenwood Gallery, Dhruva Mistry, 7 October - 17 November 1990.

A. Wilson, Dhruva Mistry, Nigel Greenwood Gallery, October 1990, plate 21, illustrated.

Born in Gujarat, artist Dhruva Mistry draws inspiration from the eminent sculptural tradition of India, infusing his work with nuances of Western Modernism and ancient Cycladic stone carving. A student and one-time professor at Baroda College in India, Mistry's work vacillates in scale between the intimate and the monumental. Credited with a series of major public commissions throughout England and in Japan, Mistry embarked on a series of small sculptures entitled Dialectal Images in the late 1980s. In this series the artist investigates both the search for truth, rooted in the word "dialectic", and the boundaries of language or "dialect". Created through a process of direct-wax bronze casting, Mistry expounds on the nature of his medium believing "that sculpture is a practical and scientific demonstration of physical systems to create and invent forms." Sakshi Gallery, Dhruva Mistry: Table Pieces: 2003-04, 22 January - 8 February 2005, Mumbai, p. 7.