Samant, Mohan

Born in Bombay, Samant graduated from the city’s prestigious Sir J. J. School of Art in 1952, and joined the Progressive Artists Group that same year. His work draws inspiration from many sources, including the art of Paul Klee and Pablo Picasso, as well as from Basohli painting, the celebrated Pahari school whose ideas and techniques he studied during his college years. Door of the Heart reflects this eclecticism, displaying the bold lines and colors of Basohli painting filtered through the lens of Abstract Expressionism. Equally experimental in his use of diverse media, Samant applied sand and acrylic to his canvases in the early 1960s, crafting richly textured pieces that are as sculptural as they are painterly.