Portraits of the Self is the second successive exhibition curated by Abhay Maskara, that places the human body in focus - revealing not only its strength and passion, but also its vulnerability and sensuality. While the previous show was centered around the female form, this show is an enquiry into masculinity and the male form.
Max Streicher and Parag Sonarghare - the two artists in this show, come from very different backgrounds and work in contrasting mediums and styles. Yet they are connected, in their practice, through their preoccupation with the body.
Streicher hails from Toronto, Canada and studied theology, before training in art. He is best known for his colossal, inflated figures and their engagement with architectural spaces. His fascination with the forces that animate matter, arises in part, from his interest in theology. His figures, even at their most abstract - inflate like heaving chests, and pulsate like beating hearts. They are present as physical bodies and remind us of life - as being both miraculous and ephemeral.
Four colossal figures make up Sleeping Giants - as they inhale and exhale in their enormous mass, to the timed intervals of industrial blowers. Lying on their backs and sides, heads raised from the floor, legs stiffened, chests inflated; only to relax again, as if in an ineffective attempt to stand on their feet. The giants recall the body as gross anatomy - incapable of action, with a sentiment of futility. They also recall the tragic body - needy, voracious, desiring, and bereft of consciousness and will.
In contrast to Max Streicher’s abstract yet unmistakably anthropomorphic characters, the human figures in Parag Sonarghare’s paintings are decidedly hyperreal.
Originally from Nagpur, Sonarghare lives and works in Baroda, and trained as a painter before doing a Masters in Art History. Though in his 20’s, the three male figures that Sonarghare portrays in his Untitled works on canvas, are of older men from the lower socio-economic strata. Painted in a larger-than-life format, the men are seated naked and bear the marks of time – wrinkles, wounds, rough edges and imperfections. Yet they seem unperturbed by their condition. Here one of modern society’s most marginalised segments, is painted into prominence.
Sonarghare is interested in painting the nude body - insofar as to expose the soul through the map of the skin. The choice of subject, treatment and scale of the work - allows the artist to draw attention to ordinary people, with extraordinary sensitivity and skill.
As we encounter the figures of Streicher and Sonarghare, we are prompted to journey back to our own bodies. To look at the physical experience of now - with empathy and emotion.