| Medium | : | Acrylic |
|---|---|---|
| Height | : | 42 inch / 106.7 cm |
| Width | : | 36 inch / 91.4 cm |
| Surface | : | Canvas |
| Style | : | Figurative Paintings |
| Dimension | : | W: 91.4 cm × H: 106.7 cm |
| Year | : | 2023 |
A powerful contemporary artwork that blends surreal imagery with emotional symbolism. Featuring a central blue figure carrying a dreamlike world overhead, the painting explores themes of memory, identity, and the emotional weight of human experience through bold colors and expressive forms.
Ashoke Mullick | Holding Mountain | Acrylic on Canvas | 42 x 36 inches | 2023
This deeply expressive artwork presents a surreal and emotionally charged vision of human thought, memory, and imagination. At the center sits a striking blue figure, poised between movement and stillness, carrying an entire world above its head. The floating landscape — filled with clustered homes, swirling skies, and a glowing red form — feels like a metaphor for dreams, burdens, and the chaos of modern existence. Around the figure, a sea of abstract red forms and fragmented faces creates an atmosphere of tension and collective emotion.
The artist uses bold contrasts, layered textures, and symbolic imagery to transform the canvas into a psychological landscape. The blue figure appears both powerful and vulnerable, as though balancing personal memories, societal expectations, and inner conflict all at once. The vibrant striped garment adds rhythm and energy, while the dramatic color palette intensifies the painting’s emotional depth. This artwork invites viewers to interpret their own meanings within its surreal storytelling, making it both visually captivating and intellectually engaging.
I like to depict the modern times when people have lost all human contact and have become mechanised. They read newspapers, pick up some jargon and communicate most of the time by telephone. As a painter, I throw light on these aspects where traditions are breaking down and the relationship between generations is getting lost.
Ashoke Mullick is considered one of the leading painters from the Bengal School of Art. Mullick combines a sense of satire with contemporary conditions. His paintings focus strongly on the ordinary man and the contradictions he faces.
Sometimes the look is satiric at other times, it is compassionate, says Mullick of his own works. He uses colours like greens and blues to depict a largely urban India.
Mullick was educated at the Fine Arts Government College, Kolkata. He was greatly fascinated and influenced by works of painters like Gaganendranath Tagore. I was also influenced by German Expressionism that linked art to life. The effects I create are intentional and I want them to become a part of visual experience, he says.
He mostly works in oil on canvas, because as he says, That’s the medium which let’s me experiment the most and which helps me to depict modern life, which in some ways is surrealistic.
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