Avinash Chandra

Born In Simla On 28 August 1931. Avinash Chandra’s artistic career was defined by the constant pursuit of a
personal style that could reconcile Indian subjects and Western Modernism. Chandra received his early training at the
Delhi Polytechnic Art School, which introduced him to European and American art movements. He then attended
Central School of Art in London, where he began to create oil paintings influenced by Vincent van Gogh and Chaim
Soutine. His early works were abstracted and colorful landscapes featuring the hills in his childhood city of Simla—a
subject he would revisit near the end of his career. In the late 1950s, Chandra abandoned what he considered to be
the rigidity inherent in his training, to freely pursue his individual aesthetic. The main subject in his later works was the
female body, rendered in elegant lines and sometimes with erotic admiration.
Chandra was the first Indian artist to exhibit at one of the most important art events worldwide—Documenta in
Kassel, West Germany, in 1964. Widely collected, especially by museums in the U.K., Chandra won fellowships in the
1960s from the John D. Rockefeller III Fund and the Fairfield Foundation. He passed away in London on 15
September 1991.
The 1960s saw Avinash Chandra gain recognition as a ‘powerful’ artist by the artistic community in London, and
receive much publicity in the UK media. He traveled and exhibited in art galleries across the UK, Europe and North
America, was introduced to Queen Elizabeth, and had a BBC documentary made about his work. In 1965, Avinash
Chandra became the first Indian-British artist to have work displayed at the Tate Gallery in London. He moved to New
York in 1966 and returned to London in 1969.