An Unreasoned Act of Being

No discourse on Indian modernist sculpture would be complete without according a position of centrality to Himmat Shah.

Born in Lothal in 1933, into a Jain mercantile family, Himmat appears to have spent his childhood in deep absorption of familial influence, even as he resisted familial ties. J. Swaminathan was to describe him "as a bird who has forgotten how to stop migrating".
For over four decades now, Himmat has demonstrated his leading preoccupations, primarily in drawing and sculpture. If one stands back to take a telescopic view of his sculpture, it would probably fall in the areas of enigma, domesticity and sheer whim. Himmat turns conventional scale into a mockery and allows for sheer play to dominate his vision, wherein architectural structures are dwarfed and heads enlarged to an enigmatic monumentality. Himmat Shah’s work does not appear to judge the human condition. Instead, it appears to present its existential state, through terms that defy simple definition.