Untitled

Artist: Jitendra Dangi
Medium: Acrylic on Canvas
Size: 24 × 48 inches
Year: 2022

This painting presents a vivid and symbolic exploration of the interrelationship between humanity, nature, and ritual, rendered through a contemporary visual language that merges elements of folk and surrealist art. The composition is immediately dominated by a bright yellow background, an energizing field of color that imbues the scene with a sense of warmth and vitality. This chromatic intensity recalls the symbolic use of color in Indian folk and tribal traditions, where yellow often signifies divinity, renewal, and life force.

The three central figures, part-human and part-insect, occupy the pictorial space in a rhythmic arrangement suggestive of performance or ritual. Their elongated, coiled bodies, reminiscent of serpents or earthworms, may be interpreted as metaphors for the cyclical nature of existence and humanity’s rootedness in the earth. This motif resonates with agrarian symbolism found in indigenous and rural visual cultures across South Asia, where fertility, transformation, and regeneration are recurring themes.

Each figure is engaged in a distinct musical act: drumming, blowing a horn, or gesturing with a reed-like stick. Music and rhythm here operate as vehicles of communion and continuity, suggesting a deep cultural connection to oral traditions and performative rituals. Such representations align with broader art-historical dialogues around the relationship between body, sound, and spirituality—echoing, for instance, the ritual processions and folk performances that informed the modernist reinterpretations of Indian visual art in the post-independence period.

The artist’s stylization, marked by linear precision, strong contours, and an interplay of earthy browns and saturated hues, evokes the visual language of folk painting, while the surreal metamorphosis of form introduces a distinctly modern sensibility. The figures’ elaborate headgear and jewelry, incorporating organic and ornamental motifs, reflect a synthesis of cultural identity and imaginative transformation. This fusion of traditional iconography with contemporary formal experimentation situates the work within the lineage of modern Indian artists who have drawn upon vernacular aesthetics to articulate new narratives of identity and belonging.

The painting can be seen as a meditation on the coexistence of the human and the natural, the sacred and the everyday. It bridges myth and modernity, suggesting that creativity itself is an act of transformation, an ongoing dialogue between inherited traditions and evolving sensibilities. The result is a visually compelling and intellectually resonant image that celebrates the continuity of cultural expression through form, rhythm, and collective memory.