A Reading Path Down a Rabbit Hole: Natvar Bhavsar

A master’s stroke

All abstract art is marked by necessitating viewers to see beyond the “aesthetic” value a work may have. Natvar has contributed an unrivalled ability to turn this (often times difficult) necessity into an inviting prospect. The colours are warm. They are massive. They are the inexhaustible detail of starry night condensed into metres of canvas.

Natvar Bhavsar in his studio, taken from artist website

NATVAR BHAVSAR

Gujaratis are known for color. When you throw Holi, it is the whole sky, the dust of it. That is how I see color

South Asia Journal

“I prefer conversation to email” he tells me “because there is more flow”. Flux is an important concept for him. Not in the sense of the Fluxist art movement, but of constant change, the Heraclitan kind.

Abeed: Sure. Recently I was reading some Nietzsche and I came across this interesting quote where he said ‘All artistic expression comes from a single physiological state, which is one of intoxication.’

Bhavsar: I think he’s really close to putting it in words. Although, the word ‘intoxication’ has a certain meaning. Your spirit needs to be aroused. If you want to call that ‘intoxication’ sure, but that’s a more physical concept. But when you’re speaking of an experience of spiritual enlightenment, it’s not necessarily a physical experience. Of course, he’s describing a state he experienced and generalized that experience, and that’s how words are, they’re limited.

Natvar Bhavsar, “VISHAKAA” (1969), dry pigments with oil and acrylic mediums on canvas, 82 x 96.5 inches

Open Magazine

Even though my father died when I was 10, I was able to follow my north star. My interest in presenting my art in India is not to enrich myself. I want to tell the story of how I went abroad and explored my individuality. I was given many opportunities and have seen huge achievements.

Natvar Bhavsar, “SATVAA I” (2003), Pure color pigment on canvas. Courtesy of Sundaram Tagore Gallery.

Buffalo AKG Art Museum: Exhibition Announcement

As a child, his palms and soles were painted with Kumkum, a vermillion powder used to ward off evil. As Bhavsar explains, “art requires a sense of color. Just like music is about sound – its presence or absence – so art is about color. I wanted to show the world the color of the red bindi, the particular vermillion, that color, and how to paint it on canvas, how to look at it and understand it.”

The titles of his works often stem from Sanskrit words for natural phenomena or Hindu cosmology, underscoring the sacred and cosmological dimensions at play.

Natvar Bhavsar, SANSKRITEE, 2006, Pure pigment on canvas, 108 × 54 in | 274.3 × 137.2 cm

Rediff.com

Q. How did you hurt your back?

A. The work that I do is physically very strenuous. I have always said it is back-breaking. You have to stretch into unusual positions for long periods at a time, sometimes for six to seven hours. You have to control minute elements in the work without moving.

Which are the places you return to?

Ajanta and Ellora. I’ve been there six times, Janet five times, the children four times. We have traveled a lot in India – I fell in love with Kerala and wanted to buy a place there – and Europe, in Brittany, Spain, England. We have traveled for 20 days at a stretch, driving through Europe enjoying great art, culture and food.

Coming from India, I feel Europe is more appropriate – the satisfaction you get from enjoying local life in parts of Italy. We are not connected to the earth in America but to commerce and urban life, which is sad: there are extraordinary landscapes here too.

RA-TU, 1970, Dry pigments with oil and acrylic mediums on canvas, 44 × 38 in | 111.8 × 96.5 cm

So many of the artists you knew are now gone, their careers cut short by alcoholism, suicide, and chaotic personal lives. How did you manage to remain unscathed?

I knew from a very young age what I would not do. You have to love yourself more than you love your social life. You have to love your art more than anything. If you do that, the rewards will come.

Sreengar I, 2002, Pure pigments and acrylic on heavy wove paper, 46 × 35 in | 116.8 × 88.9 cm

Buffalo AKG Art Museum: Free Yourself

I have tried to convey how to free oneself, using color as a force to reach towards the beauty and generosity of the material that allows you unlimited expression.

Untitled, 1971, Acrylic Paint, Acrylic Polymer, Paper, 12 1/2 × 11 3/4 in | 31.8 × 29.8 cm