Pride Month Special: Bhupen Khakhar's Coming Out Painting and Amrita Sher-Gil's Letter
This week in Daak:
1. You Can’t Please All by Bhupen Khakhar, 1981, Tate
2. Amrita Sher-Gil’s Letter
3. Reading in Different South Asian Languages
1. You Can’t Please All by Bhupen Khakhar, 1981, Tate
Bhupen Khakhar’s iconic work and arguably his coming out painting, “You Can’t Please All” shows a naked man witnessing a scene from a famous Aesop’s Fable – a father and son ride through town with a donkey. When the son rides the donkey, the onlookers remark that he too selfish to give up the seat for this father. When the father rides the donkey, they remark that the man is burdening the poor donkey with his weight. So, if you’re tired of other people’s opinions and judgment, follow your own inner voice and do what feels right!
2. Amrita Sher-Gil’s Letter
At the mere age of sixteen, Amrita Sher-Gil travelled to Paris to study art and while in Paris, she had a number of romantic relationships (who wouldn’t?). It was rumoured that she even had a relationship with another woman, Marie Louise Chasseny, who was also a painter. Upon hearing these rumours, her mother promptly wrote her a letter to enquire about this supposed affair. Sher-Gil’s reply, both serious and playful, betrays a lucid awareness of her own sexuality and a tenacity of spirit which is striking for a person so young. Enjoy the excerpt below:
My dear Mummy,
Do you know that I am of age? So, please do respect me, my dear clever and understanding mother... I never had any relationship with Marie Louise, and will not have one either. And you can believe me. Knowing how unprejudiced, objective and intelligent you are, I am going to be very frank with you. I confess that I also think as you do about the disadvantages of relationships with men. But since I need to relieve my sexuality physically somehow (because I think it is impossible to spiritualize, idealize sexuality completely in art, and channelizing it through art for a lifetime is impossible, only a stupid superstition invented for the brainless), so I thought I would start a relationship with a woman when the opportunity arises…
3. Reading in Different South Asian Languages
Looking to diversify your reading list? Join our summer reading interns on Slack where they will share snippets of prose and poetry, along with the themes, ideas and questions emerging from their readings. Join Malayalam prose with Afnan or Marathi poetry with Sakshi for more.