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Tyeb Mehta

 Born in Kapadwarj, Gujarat – Tyeb Mehta is one of the most well-known Indian artists of his generation. He briefly worked as a film editor and then joined Sir J.J. School of Art in Mumbai to study art and graduated in year 1952. Tyeb Mehta became a part of Bombay Progressive Artists Group.

He was a strong film maker, His one and only film, Koodal was also a masterpiece of such montages, where he tries to project the same or similar images through a different medium. He won a National Award for the film.

Bulls, Rickshaw pullers, Kali were some of the main subjects of his artworks. His work is characterized by matte surface, diagonal lines breaking his canvasses and images of anguish – a result of pre occupation with formalist means of expression. Use of flat planes of colour provided the canvasses an intense means of expression in his oeuvre of work. A transformation occurred in his painting style when he visited America, it was during his stay in America that Abstract Expressionism was explored. However, his stay in Shantiniketan influenced his subjects. Goddess Kali and Durga were the most famous subject for him. He found contentment in painting her in all her forms.

One of the most definitive leaps that Tyeb Mehta made as an artist was the introduction of the diagonal in his paintings which was a result of an accident. In 1969, he thought he had hit dead end and in a flounce of frustration he flung a black streak across his canvas. Then as the drama of the diagonal hit him, he knew he had made a breakthrough for the slanting gash was biblical equivalent of the verb ‘Cleave’ that once unites and separates.

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