Lot 70: REKHA RODWITTIYA (B. 1958)

REKHA RODWITTIYA (B. 1958)
Sharing Secrets
signed, inscribed, titled and dated '"SHARING SECRETS" OIL + ACRYLIC 1996 Rodwittiya' (on the reverse)
oil and acrylic on canvas
71 3/8 x 47 7/8 in. (181.3 x 121.6 cm.)
Painted in 1996

N. Tuli, Indian Contemporary Painting, Ahmedabad, 1997, p. 180 (illustrated)

PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE COLLECTOR, NEW YORK

Who bangs so loudly on the doors of my mind and insists that I let them in?
Do you not know that saffron stains forever;
And that strident voices that call to arms
Bring the scourge of death disguised as marching bands
That betray their prophet's wisdom?
Maybe I can find the twilight that neither holds the sun or the moon in its skies.
Rekha Rodwittiya (Artist Statement, Rekha@fifty, 2008)
Rekha Rodwittiya raises compelling questions by exploring notions of femininity and objectivity through striking colors and monumental forms. Challenging India's patriarchal restrictions, the female body acts as a vehicle for cultural, social and political critique. Here the relative absence of the male figure is not so much a measure of exclusion as it is a positive assertion of the female protagonist.
Sharing Secrets (1996) was conceived within a politically alert feminist practice and reaches toward an interventionist purpose. The viewer is left to wonder what primordial secret the shell is transmitting.