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M.F.Hussain:My Take

Discussion in 'Snippets of Life (Non-Fiction)' started by Balajee, Jun 12, 2011.

  1. Balajee

    Balajee IL Hall of Fame

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    So M.F.Hussain is dead, gone and buried. The TV channels had obviously run short of stories that day so that they kept extolling him as "Indian Picasso" repeatedly long enough to make the viewers develop nausea and puke. But my take on him is somewhat different.

    My very first memory of M.F.Hussain, when I was a kid of five or six.was not a positive one. , I saw a car painted in garish colours outside the flats for members of parliament in Delhi/s North Avenue. "That 's M.F.Hussain's car. He is a member of parliament"my dad said (Hussain had then been nominated to Rajya Sabha for his "artistic" achievements)

    That convinced me that anyone who could do such awful things to a fairly good car must be nuts.. But as I grew up I realized that there was a method in his madness. His outrageous activities were aimed at self-promotion. He was very good in selling his so-called art by selling himself.His giving up anykind of footwear and getting kicked out of elite clubs for trying to enter there barefoot made big news.That and other stunts ensured that he remained in ,limelight.

    My next encounter , if you can call that was during emergency when I saw him putting up a painting depicting Indira Gandhi as Durga i in the central park Connaught Place., revealing his knack for fawning before the powers-that-be.

    Hw was not above exploiting unfortunate and tragic incidents for personal gain. When leftwing theatre activist Safdar Hashmi was brutally murdered Hussain came up with a painting on the killing. But soon it was revealed that he had paintied it long before Safdar's killing and was merely using the unfortunate occasion to promote his work. Hussain's acolytes rushed to defend the "master" saying he could have had a premonition of Safdar's death! Well, if Hussain could predict deaths, he should have set himself up as Hussain Baba. With his ability to market himself, he would have made billions as a godman.

    An interview by reowned artist Safdar Hyder Raza in Times of India shows Hussain in his true colours. Raza said Hussain when he talked of his works never discussed the aesthetic qualities but the price his paintings would fetch from buyers. For him art was just a commodity and what he was creating were just marketable goods. And he did market them well, enough to convince many rich and famous that possessing a Hussain was a status symbol! But frankly he was a substandard artist.

    He once dismissed Raja Ravi Varma as a calandar artist. But Hussain's art never rose above the level of wall posters. Just google for his painting of Mother Teresa and her nuns. In the picture they give the impression of being ringwraiths from the Lord of the Rings triology who are busy making a meal of a corpse..

    And the clever man by provoking Hindu fundies with his nude pics of Hindu goddesses ensured that the fools worked as promotional agents for his work. and in their blind, fanatical rage they fell into his trap .

    Thanks to the zealots our man rose to become a persecuted global figure from a national one. That increased the price of his work at auction houses considerably. The threat of damage to his works by the rightwing extremists sent their market value sky high.

    .So how does one judge Hussain> For me he was no victim or martyr but a brazen exhibitionist who was clever enough to market his extremely limited talents in such a way that he convinced lot of artistically challenged people that he was a genius.His life must be studied in management schools as a case history for marketing and sales and his works ignored by art schools.
     
  2. naanvetti

    naanvetti Senior IL'ite

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    hey Balajee,
    I have always been curious on what ppl think about M.F.H, I NEVER thought from your angle :)
    My opinion - i liked him, did feel sorry for him bcos he had to leave india. felt he was a great artist.
     
  3. jaanu143

    jaanu143 Gold IL'ite

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    Hey balajee, i completely agree with u..i just hate him for reason painting nude pictures of godess..watever religion one belong, no one have right to do that.. My first reaction after listening to news is, thank god , finally...
     
  4. Kamalji

    Kamalji IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Balaji,

    yes i read Raza today in TOI, and even i was surprised, since i dont know about paintings, i did not post a blog, for i am zero in these matters.

    Regards

    kamal
     
  5. mayachaudhuri

    mayachaudhuri Senior IL'ite

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    A great pleasure to read that someone thought about Hussein the same way as me...He was really obnoxious..There are many greaat painters in India and he certainly is not Indias Pcasso !!!!
     
  6. Kamla

    Kamla IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Balajee,

    I enjoyed reading your take on MFHussain. You are really very astute! Loved the way you have analyzed MFH's persona. I have to agree on all those points you make about him for often, I too have felt the same about him.

    I should not be making any statements though about his 'art' work for I have not seen them. Yet, from the few press coverages and what appeared in the media, he did come across as an exhibitionist.

    Let me tell you that you have earned both my admiration and respect for the way you express your views even if it may ruffle few feathers. If we are not honest enough to call a spade a spade, mediocrity will only rule the roost and the quality of life will just go down the drain.

    Thank you for these thought provoking posts.

    L, Kamla
     
  7. Srama

    Srama Finest Post Winner

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    Balajee, it indeed made a very interesting read. Sitting here in India, I was wonderinga about all the coverage he has been getting. His approach had always me bothered me at a personal level - it is not the nudity or any such thing but his obsessive nature, his show off nature etc and finally when I read in a news paper Madhuri Dixit say that he was not actually obsessed with her but the charcater of her in that movie, I almost had a sense of relief - thank God she feels that way is what I felt. Yet again, I have not bothered to look up his paintings - while I love art and dabble in it, he never came up as an artist to look up! Just reading about him was annoying many times and I would simply skip! Look like there are nore people who agree with you than not :) I am sure he made an impression on many others and may be deserves the homage he is being paid! Whatever the reasons, he seemed to have a zest for life!
     
  8. kkrish

    kkrish IL Hall of Fame

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    I enjoyed reading this article Balajee! I don't know anything about this artist but from what you had written I could get some idea! I searched for information about him and saw some of his paintings...yes you are rihgt not any different or unique from other painitngs!
    Good article...I learnt something new today!
     
  9. satchitananda

    satchitananda IL Hall of Fame

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    Balajee,

    I have not seen any of MFH's paintings, but I have certainly seen Ravi Varma's. And his paintings are among the very few that have made an impression deep enough to stay in all their beauty and detail in my mind after all these years. That is not something I can say of many "modern" paintings, which I shall honestly say, I am probably too stupid to understand or to appreciate. But that is that. Ravi Varma was able to reach out to a few stupids like me and leave a long lasting impression on us. Anyone who says that he was a calendar artist - well, I just have to agree to disagree.
     
  10. Balajee

    Balajee IL Hall of Fame

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    Hussain was good at selling himself. He was a marketing genius but as an artist, his talents were questionable. No one exiled him from India. He left because he was scared of facing a number of court cases pending against him.
     

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