| Medium | : | Watercolour |
|---|---|---|
| Height | : | 22.5 inch / 57.2 cm |
| Width | : | 30 inch / 76.2 cm |
| Surface | : | Thick Imported Paper |
| Style | : | Animals paintings, Figurative Paintings |
| Dimension | : | W: 76.2 cm × H: 57.2 cm |
A dreamlike watercolor featuring a surreal, antlered creature resting on a quiet landscape. With soft washes and a mysterious atmosphere, the artwork blurs the line between reality and imagination, inviting personal interpretation.
Kartick Chandra Pyne | Untitled | Watercolour on Thick Imported Paper | 30 x 22.5 inches
This watercolor unfolds like a fragment of a dream — strange, poetic, and quietly powerful. At its center lies a surreal creature, part animal and part imagination, resting along a strip of green land that separates sky from water. Its elongated body, painted in deep purples and magentas, feels both grounded and otherworldly, while the antler-like extensions rise sharply, almost like thoughts branching into the unknown.
There’s a striking stillness in the way the creature occupies the space — neither moving nor fully at rest. Its dark, expressive eye holds a quiet intensity, as if aware of something beyond the visible world. Around it, the landscape is rendered in soft, fluid washes: a gentle green terrain, a calm blue water body below, and an open, pale sky above. The minimal background allows the form to breathe, giving it an almost symbolic presence.
Small, distant silhouettes — barely noticeable at first — add an intriguing narrative layer. They introduce a sense of scale and mystery, suggesting that this is not just a landscape, but a place where reality bends and stories linger beneath the surface.
The beauty of this work lies in its ambiguity. It doesn’t explain itself; instead, it invites you to sit with it, to question what you see, and to find your own meaning within its quiet strangeness. Executed in watercolor on thick imported paper, the piece carries a delicate balance of control and spontaneity, where each brushstroke feels instinctive yet intentional.
Born into an aristocratic family of gold merchants, Kartick Chandra Pyne took an interest in art at an early age.
The older cousin of Ganesh Pyne, another remarkable Indian modernist,
K. C. Pyne graduated in fine arts from the Government College of Arts and Crafts, Calcutta, in 1955. Later, he taught at Calcutta’s Indian College of Arts and Draughtsmanship in the 1970s, and the Academy of Fine Arts in the ’80s.
One of India’s foremost surrealist painters who was influenced by artists such as Rabindranath Tagore, Marc Chagall, and Joan Miró, Pyne famously said, ‘I did not really know that I worked in the surrealist style till it was pointed out to me.’ His works, spontaneous and individualistic, had surreal imagery in bold colours. A four-time winner of the award of the Academy of Fine Arts, Calcutta, Pyne had represented India in the exhibition titled ‘100 Years of Modern Indian Art’ held at the Fukuoka Museum, Japan, in 1979.
An intensely private person, he preferred to pause, reflect and focus on painting while exploring a range of subjects — myth, fables, human stories, culture, memories, fantasy, erotica — in a vibrant palette. Art, for Pyne, was an intimate approach, thus requiring the artist to still the mind and experience the meditative aspect of creation.
Nothing stopped him, not even a paralytic stroke that affected the left side of his body in 1994. In fact, in the late ’90s, Pyne painted his acclaimed nude series. He was painting till a year before his death, for as long as he could hold a brush, at his home in Kolkata.
If you’d prefer the artwork to arrive ready to hang, please get in touch with us to arrange framing and shipping at applicable charges.
Please note: Customs duties and import taxes may apply at your destination in accordance with your country’s regulations. Refer to our International Shipment document for guidance and support.
| Medium | |
|---|---|
| Height | |
| Width | |
| Surface | |
| Style |
