Tail-Tale

In his paintings, the artist approaches tradition via the folk forms of popular religious traditions such as the Nathdwara School of painting. Ambalal's paintings give evidence of an important tendency in contemporary Indian art - that of a contemporary approach to tradition via the folk forms of popular religious traditions. He is inspired by the traditional art forms and by the everyday life of Gujarat and traditional art forms such as the 'Picchawais' religious painted cloth and Rajasthani paintings of Nathdwara. His paintings in this sense, make an interesting interface with his passion for art history. In depicting the everyday and its seemingly mundane aspects, Ambalal deploys a naive and child-like style. This work (see also IS 50 1993) is typical of his bright colour palette and humorous style.

In this painting for example, we see the figure of a cow, a calf and a man. The background is painted with a flat strip of green at the bottom to indicate grass, the larger central section of blue represents the sky and the small strip of yellow at the top the sun.