THE COLOURS MELDED TOGETHER IN RAJENDRA DHAWAN'S WORKS, NEVER IN CONTRAST, NEVER OPPOSED TO EACH OTHER, HAVING, INSTEAD, A QUIET CONVERSATION, ONE MOVING SEAMLESSLY INTO ANOTHER.

Born in 1936 in New Delhi, he studied at the Polytechnic (later renamed College of Art) from 1953-58, and at Belgrade in erstwhile Yugoslavia from 1960-62. While in New Delhi, he became a founding member of the group called The Unknown that survived from 1960-64.

Dhawan participated in many shows following his return from Belgrade and also taught art at a college in Phagwara, Punjab. However, he left for Paris in 1970 to study at École des Beaux-Arts, eventually settling down in the French capital. Thereafter, he made infrequent visits to New Delhi for a few exhibitions. In Paris, the reclusive Dhawan was described by his peers as a ‘painter’s painter’ and comparisons were made of his work with those of V. S. Gaitonde and J. Swaminathan.

Two other prominent Indian abstractionists were Dhawan’s contemporaries in Paris — S. H. Raza and V. Viswanadhan—but unlike them, Dhawan did not claim an indigenist abstraction, simply letting his art be for its own sake.

The metaphysical nature of Dhawan’s work stayed constant throughout his career. Looking back at a lifetime of work, in 2011, a year before he passed away, Dhawan observed in an exhibition catalogue: ‘My works have evolved as I have with time. I paint today as I did years ago, but when I sometimes look back, I see that change. It was a subtle, slow change.’