The Dream Caravan

When you enter the most current show by Gulammohammed Sheikh, a large blue painting on one wall draws your . Noah’s Ark is similar to Kaarawaan. It features portraits of a diverse range of artists, including MF Husain, Vincent van Gogh, Frida Kahlo, Pablo Picasso, Diego Rivera, Rabindranath Tagore, Leonardo da Vinci, FN Souza, Bhupen Khakhar, and others. They seem to be being transported across the sea of time by the boat.

It also has guardian saints, drawing inspiration from the Pahadi painter Nainsukh’s Boat Adrift a River from the 18th century. The ark, symbolized by the raging seas, is a kind of symbol of our syncretic culture and a sign of hope at a stormy period. The 80 x 257-inch canvas, which was finished between 2019 and 2023, features the “past converge with the present,” according to the 87-year-old artist. The artist often collaborates on enormous canvases with a group of helpers, all of whom get proper credit for their contributions.

This title piece serves as the inspiration for the Vadehra Art Gallery’s show, Kaarawaan and Other Works. “It’s about packing up once-in-a-lifetime experiences and sailing off to an unknown destination,” Sheikh says. It features both painted and real-life human subjects. The locations are mostly made up of references to places I may have visited in dreams or in real life. It features musicians who throughout the years have influenced my vision.

Kabir and Francis
The audience is encouraged to take part and become a part of the “kaarawaan.”” The literary community is well familiar with the Vadodara-based artist. Do writing and art influence one another? While they may overlap, writing and painting are still separate disciplines since you don’t necessarily paint what you write or write what you paint. They also coincide at the same moment. In any case, you go through amazing realms,” he remarks.

Gandhi, the father of the nation, and Kabir, the spiritual poet and saint of India, both had enduring effects. Throughout their lives, they both battled for equality and a fair society. We are fortunate to have such great role models in our life who teach us new things every day. Actually, our collective legacy includes the poetry of Kabir, Meera, Surdas, and Khusrow, which has inspired generations of people. The artist, who painted poetry by Kabir for an exhibition in the early 1990s, adds, “I like to revisit their words to see if I can find a visual equivalency in my paintings.”

Another piece from the current exhibition is a giant painting called “Francis and Kabir,” which has a tiny image of Gandhi in the center and St. Francis and Kabir on each side of a circular map of the globe. Images of both violence and calm surround it. One picture that stands out is of a young Syrian kid who was discovered face-down on a beach after drowning while trying to reach Greece. This 78.5 by 123.5-inch painting took more than ten years to complete. Work on it began in 2010. The map is a haphazard rendition of the one made in the thirteenth century in Germany by Gervase of Ebstorf.

Sheikh remarks, “Baroda has been the place from where I saw the world and the world of art,” in reference to his early years of studying art in both London and Baroda. This is where I taught, painted, and studied. It shaped who I am now. I had the chance to learn about international art during my three years in London (1963–1966) via its museums, art galleries, and private collections.

The Victoria & Albert Museum’s collection of magnificent Indian paintings provided me enough to last a lifetime. It also made it possible to travel, particularly around Europe via hitchhiking and seeing places like Florence, Siena, and other European cities that are home to famous Italian artworks. I could not take my eyes off of what I saw, not even close. The mythical and historical coexist in his mind and works. Is it possible to be unaware of everything around you? In order to uncover the language of the multitude, I build my own tales integrating several genres,” he explains.