| Medium | : | Watercolour |
|---|---|---|
| Height | : | 20 inch / 50.8 cm |
| Width | : | 30 inch / 76.2 cm |
| Surface | : | Paper |
| Style | : | Animals paintings, Figurative Paintings |
| Dimension | : | W: 76.2 cm × H: 50.8 cm |
A minimal yet expressive watercolor of a solitary striped fish set against soft blue washes. With bold lines and a calm, open composition, the artwork evokes quiet contemplation and the beauty of simplicity.
Kartick Chandra Pyne | Untitled | Watercolour on Paper | 30 x 20 inches
There’s something immediately charming and disarming about this watercolor — its simplicity feels intentional, almost like a quiet whisper rather than a loud statement. Set against a gently layered blue background, the fish floats calmly, suspended in a space that feels both like water and like a memory of water.
The artist uses loose, horizontal washes of blue to create a rhythmic backdrop, evoking the soft movement of currents without detailing them explicitly. In contrast, the fish is defined with bold, confident black strokes — its striped body, spiky dorsal fin, and rounded eye giving it a playful yet slightly introspective personality. It doesn’t appear to be swimming anywhere in particular; instead, it simply exists, as if lost in its own world.
What makes the work engaging is this balance between naivety and control. The form is almost childlike in its directness, yet the composition feels carefully considered. The emptiness around the fish becomes meaningful — it allows space for thought, for pause, for a quiet connection between the viewer and the subject.
Rendered in watercolor on paper, the piece carries a lightness and immediacy, where every brushstroke remains visible, honest, and unpretentious. It’s a work that invites you to slow down and appreciate the beauty of simplicity — where even a solitary fish can hold a universe of feeling.
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.
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