Priya Singh
Head of Department
Lot 15
Sadequain(1930-1987)Untitled (Figures in a forest)
10 December 2024, 15:00 GMT
London, New Bond StreetSold for £10,880 inc. premium
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Louise Almeras
Cataloguer
Sadequain (1930-1987)
Untitled (Figures in a forest)
signed and dated 'Sadequain 19/3/62' lower right
pen on paper
32.5 x 56.1cm (12 13/16 x 22 1/16in).
signed and dated 'Sadequain 19/3/62' lower right
pen on paper
32.5 x 56.1cm (12 13/16 x 22 1/16in).
Footnotes
Provenance
Property from a private collection, UK.
Acquired in the 1960s-1970s;
Thence by descent.
'Sadequain's great contribution to modern art in Pakistan was that he amplified it with the living cultural resources of his broad and deep tradition in his own style and according to his conscience as no other artist could do.' Akbar Naqvi, Image and Identity: Fifty years of painting and sculpture in Pakistan, Pakistan, 1998, p. 403.
After winning the Pakistan National prize for painting in 1960, Sadequain was invited by the French Committee of the International Association of Plastic Arts to visit Paris. Already a celebrated artist in Pakistan, the next few years in Paris catapulted Sadequain onto the international stage. In 1961 he was awarded the 'Laureate Bienniale de Paris' at the Paris Biennale and the scholarship prize enabled him to remain in Paris.
The two lots offered in this auction were painted during his time in Paris, and illustrate the distinguished calligraphic cubist style that Sadequain invented. Influenced by the sculptures of Picasso and the Spanish arabesque of González, these heavily stylized, statuesque and monumental figures are depicted in broad sweeping lines, bearing the influence of the École de Paris. Responsible for the resurrection of Islamic calligraphy, he transformed the art of calligraphy into these eye-catching expressionist paintings. He married this with the scratched surface, which gives these works volume and amplifies their flatness. Resembling a cobweb, there is an intricacy and detail to these works which defies their appearance of simplicity.
To see a similar work sold in these rooms see Bonhams, Modern & Contemporary South Asian Art, 6th June 2023, lot 11.