Fishes I
Description
Across a pale, open field, fish fall like rain. Dozens of them descend through the composition, each body filled with the flowing concentric lines that are the signature language of Gond mark-making, spiralling inward as though the creature carries its own small cosmos within. Thin vertical strokes scatter between them, suggesting water, air or the simple passage of things through space. Nothing anchors the scene to a fixed horizon. The fish are neither rising nor falling with urgency; they move through the picture plane with the unhurried certainty of creatures that belong equally to depth and to sky. At the base of the painting, undulating wave forms settle into the lower edge, offering the gentlest suggestion of water waiting below.
Sandeep Dhurve works in the Gond tradition of Madhya Pradesh, a visual language in which every living form is understood as a meeting point of pattern and spirit. The concentric fill that gives each fish its density is not simply ornament; it is the tradition's way of showing that life moves in continuous, interconnected currents. Working in acrylic on paper, Dhurve brings a graphic clarity to the composition, the white ground acting as both sky and sea, giving the repeated forms room to breathe without ever losing their collective rhythm. The dotwork atmosphere surrounding each fish charges the negative space, making the emptiness feel alive and inhabited.
Why This Artwork Stands Out
The all-over, gravity-free composition dissolves the boundary between water and air, creating a meditative visual field that invites extended looking. Each fish is individually rendered with Gond concentric patterning, giving the repeated motif an intimacy that resists mere decoration. The monochromatic palette of black on pale paper gives the work a quiet intensity, allowing form and mark to carry the full weight of the composition. Sandeep Dhurve's command of the Gond visual language transforms a single repeated subject into a sustained meditation on movement, pattern and natural abundance.