Sadanand Bakre was born in Vadodara, Gujarat, India, in 1920. After his family moved to Bombay (now Mumbai) he attended the Sir J.J. School of Art. In 1951, he moved to London, England, where he shifted his practice from sculpture to painting.
Sculptor and painter Sadanand Bakre was born in the Vadodara (also known as Baroda) district of Gujarat, India (known as 'British India' until 1947), on 10 November 1920. Following his family's move from Vadodara to Bombay (now Mumbai) around 1929, Bakre attended one of the Gokhale Education Society's schools, where his artistic inclination became noticeable. Aged 12, he was sent to the studio of the sculptor Phadke in Bombay who saw his talents at modelling in clay. Bakre had his first solo exhibition at the age of 16, showing still life and figurative drawings, watercolours, and clay models of drapery at his school. In 1939, he joined the Sir J.J. School of Art in Bombay, initially taking the course for painting before moving to the sculpture department. Although trained in a traditional Academic Realist style, he experimented with techniques, materials, and form outside his school work, and inclined towards a modernist approach that broke away from academic tradition. In 1944, he completed his Diploma in Sculpture and was awarded the Lord Harding Scholarship. Shortly following India's Independence in 1947, he founded the Bombay Progressive Artists' Group, also known as the Progressive Artists' Group, along with F. N. Souza, S. H. Raza, M. F. Husain, K. H. Ara and H. A. Gade. The only sculptor among the founding members, creating emphatically individualistic works, in particular portraits, Bakre caught the attention of leading art critic, German emigre Rudi (Rudolf) Von Leyden, who introduced him to modernist movements in America and Europe. In both his sculpture and painting, Bakre shifted away from academic realism to abstraction.
In 1951, seeking to develop an expression of Indian modernism in artistic freedom, Bakre decided to move to London, England, where he settled in Ladbroke Grove. Struggling to make a living, he took on various jobs, including as a coal miner, porter, postman, graveyard mason and carver. In 1952, he worked as a photographer for the Indian High Commission, and in 1954 he began designing jewellery. He married Dorothy, his German wife, and began exhibiting paintings in London's public parks as soon as he could afford the expenses incurred. His artistic struggle within London's art scene continued until the sculptures from his 1959 Gallery One exhibition, including Untitled, were critically reviewed in The Times. This was followed by an exhibition of sculptures and paintings at the Commonwealth Institute in 1961 that was widely reviewed. Writing for the Guardian, critic Eric Newton remarked that Bakre 'deserves recognition in England, for his skill as a sculptor and his power of convincing imagery as a painter are exceptional', noting 'the fierce scaffolding of heavy line, the expressive, spiky forms, the use of hot, aggressive colour' that had affinities with Picasso (9 February 1961, quoted in Dalmia, The Making of Modern Indian Art, p. 198). Bakre himself described his personal art philosophy in 1965 in an essay titled 'All Art is Either Good or Bad'. The 1960s marked a peak in Bakre's career, with multiple exhibitions, including a solo show at the Centaur Gallery (1962), founded by Polish émigré artist, Jan Wieliczko. The period saw Bakre experimenting with medium, technique, colour and abstraction, while his work moved from dynamic spiky forms to more simplified, solid and structural compositions, with depth provided by a strong sense of colour. Influenced by the work of Picasso, Henry Moore and Jacob Epstein, Bakre also found an affinity with the Vorticists - a modernist movement in British art and poetry - and he became a member of the New Vision Group of painters and sculptors, mainly focused on non-figurative and abstract art. He also shifted the focus of his practice from sculpture to painting.
After exhibiting in London, Paris, Switzerland, and the USA, Bakre returned to India around 1975, where he led a relatively reclusive life, feeling there were differences between his own art philosophy and the Indian art scene, which he deemed commercially-driven. He nevertheless earned a reputation as a pioneer of Indian modernism and for breaking away from traditional realism. In 2004, he received a lifetime achievement award from the Bombay Art Society. Sadanand Bakre died on 18 December 2007 in Murud in the Ratnagiri district of Maharashtra, India, following a heart attack. His work was subsequently featured in the exhibitions The Progressives & Associates in 2010, and Indian Modernist Landscapes, 1950-1970, Bakre / Ribeiro / Souza in 2016, both held at the Grosvenor Gallery, London. In 2020, he was included in Ben Uri's online exhibition Midnight's Family: 70 Years of Indian Artists in Britain. His work is not currently held in any UK public collections.
Consult items in the Ben Uri archive related to [Sadanand Bakre]
Publications related to [Sadanand Bakre] in the Ben Uri Library