Sakti Burman - Life Is A Theatre

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Sakti Burman - Life Is A Theatre

Sakti Burman - Life Is A Theatre

28th July 2022 - 10th September 2022

Art Alive Gallery, S-221 Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110017View Works

The Dramaturge of Dream and Reverie

Sakti Burman, Recent Works

Hindustani musicians describe it as riyaaz or sadhana, the daily practice in which all great artists establish themselves, across the domains of music, writing, dance, theatre, and the visual arts. It is from this constant re-dedication to their art that they generate their visions, as formally refined as they are intuitively and conceptually compelling. For Sakti Burman, the studio is where he is most himself, immersed in the ceaseless world of dream and reverie that he translates and transcribes in his oil paintings, watercolours and drawings. He is the dramaturge of these beautiful intimations of elsewhere and elsewhen.

Even while the Covid pandemic has raged globally, and he has had to cope with public urgencies as well as personal loss, Burman has remained true to his one and only compass point – that of creating a world otherwise, a world at a tangent to this present one, where anguish is negated and delight reigns. Which is not to suggest that Burman’s world is an escape into fantasy. Quite the reverse. For the artist recognises clearly the mechanisms of transience and mortality, of vulnerability and despair, against which his images give him, and us, the hope and sense of possibility to continue into the future.

Yes, we meet divine and archetypal presences in Burman’s paintings, as well as a myriad figures drawn from myth and epic, dryads and centaurs, naiads and angels. Yet look closely, and we find the artist’s family among them. We find figures familiar to us from our own time, and from the historical record. And are these personae not aspects of ourselves, acting out our own deepest impulses, our fears and desires? Among these dimensions of otherness within ourselves are the goddess Durga and the child-god Krishna, amplifications of our own instincts towards nurture and delight, glory and splendour.

And there is Harlequin from the commedia dell’arte, in his chequered costume and distinctive cap, part jester and part trickster, pensive and playful by turns, who is the artist’s special alter ego. At the core of Sakti Burman’s art is the cycle of life in all its joy and sorrow. As if looking into a river, we look into his paintings and find there parables of childhood and parenthood, bright youth and melancholy age, festivity and solemnity. Our own lives and the lives of the generations who have gone before us, seen through the prism of the fabular imagination.

Ranjit Hoskote

Sakti Burman

Krishna
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 60.96 x 55.88 | Inches : 24 x 22 | Oil on Canvas
Balance
Sakti Burman

Sculpture | Cms : 82.804 x 45.72 x 28.956 | Inches : 32.6 x 18 x 11.4 | Bronze
Pride
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
A Parade
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Dancing Clowns II
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Nandi II
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Shiva
Sakti Burman

Sculpture | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Mother Mary
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 60.96 x 48.26 | Inches : 24 x 19 | Oil on Canvas
Noah's Ark II
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 64.77 x 53.34 | Inches : 25.5 x 21 | Oil on Canvas
Artist Muse
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Harlequin with Friends
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Grace
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
The Swing II
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Children Playing
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Titien VIII
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Shiva Parvati
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Nandi
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
The Unknown Lady
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 145.796 x 114.046 | Inches : 57.4 x 44.9 | Oil on Canvas
Adam & Eve
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Adam & Eve II
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Estelle with the Bird
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Pen & Ink on Paper
Titien I
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Titien III
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Titien IV
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Pen & Ink on Paper
Titien V
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Titien VII
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Shamudra Mantan
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 88.9 x 114.3 | Inches : 35 x 45 | Oil on Canvas
Dancing to the Tune I
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Dancing to the Tune II
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Shamudra Mantan
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Ravana
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Lila
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Homage to Kalighat Painters
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 99.822 x 80.772 | Inches : 39.3 x 31.8 | Oil on Canvas
People Around Me IX
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
People Around Me X
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Ajanta
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Pen & Ink on Paper
People Around Me VII
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
People Around Me VIII
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
The Swing
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Pen & Ink on Paper
Natraj
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Life is a Theater
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 113.792 x 145.796 | Inches : 44.8 x 57.4 | Oil on Canvas
Natya II
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Pen & Ink on Paper
Natya III
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Natya V
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Natya VI
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Natya VII
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 36.322 x 30.48 | Inches : 14.3 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Affection
Sakti Burman

Sculpture | Cms : 101.6 x 53.34 x 40.64 | Inches : 40 x 21 x 16 | Bronze
Grace
Sakti Burman

Sculpture | Cms : 87.884 x 71.882 x 41.91 | Inches : 34.6 x 28.3 x 16.5 | Bronze
Thinker
Sakti Burman

Sculpture | Cms : 90.17 x 69.85 x 43.942 | Inches : 35.5 x 27.5 x 17.3 | Bronze
The Flutist I
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 99.822 x 80.772 | Inches : 39.3 x 31.8 | Oil on Canvas
Family Circus
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 99.822 x 80.772 | Inches : 39.3 x 31.8 | Oil on Canvas
The Flutist
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 71.12 x 58.42 | Inches : 28 x 23 | Oil on Canvas
Affection
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Harlequin I
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Harlequin II
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Dancing Harlequin
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Clowns
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 30.48 x 35.56 | Inches : 12 x 14 | Watercolour on Paper
Dancing Clowns
Sakti Burman

Painting | Cms : 35.56 x 30.48 | Inches : 14 x 12 | Watercolour on Paper
Manush Pakhi
Sakti Burman

Sculpture | Cms : 78.74 x 60.96 x 33.02 | Inches : 31 x 24 x 13 | Bronze