JOGEN CHOWDHURY

Born in 1939 and educated at the Government College of Art & Craft, Calcutta and subsequently at Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux Arts, Paris, Jogen came to India with his family at the time of partition. In Paris he studied at the Ecole des Beaux Arts, in William Hayter's Atelier 17. On his return in 1968 he was appointed as a textile designer in the Handloom Board in Chennai. In 1970, he joined the Calcutta Painters Group. His first collection of poems was also published in the same year. He quit his job at the Madras Handloom Board in 1972 to join the Art Gallery of Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Delhi as a Curator. He moved to New Delhi and founded the Gallery 26 and Artists' Forum  in New Delhi in 1975 along with some leading painters of New Delhi. In 1986, In 1987, Jogen Chowdhury joined Kala Bhavan, Santiniketan as Professor of painting. Beside his numerous paintings, exhibitions, he has written extensively on contemporary art. In 2014, Jogen Chowdhury was elected as a member of Rajya Sabha.

His love for the line comes probably from the Kalighat tradition of painting. Through a intense network of cross-hatch lines Jogen was able to make the flesh speak. His figures always take centre stage on his canvas or paper. The sagging flesh coupled with the wavering line distorted his figures as if they were playfully made out of terracotta. The images were however deadly serious poking fun at the human condition. His figures were wounded at times, quite like the fruit with a wedge cut out that he often painted. His art was peppered with silent lonely figures of men and women that had retracted into their shell, unable to communicate with their partners. Yet the cross hatch was used extensively to further decorate these pulpy bodies making it impossible for the viewer to avert his gaze.