by dilip padgaonkarthough sayed haidar raza spent a greater part of his life close to six decades out of india it is india that was his magnificent obsession in all his waking hours and indeed as he often confessed in the dreams that haunted him after he fell asleep when he was in full flow at his homes in paris and in gorbio a village in the south of france one could not but marvel at the eclectic range of his references a verse by kabir a psalm of tukaram lines from a muktibodh poem a stanza from the rig veda a ballad sung by a tribe of madhya pradesh a detail in an ajanta fresco a composition of mir or ghalib a quote from the holy quran or the bhagvad gita or the ramcharitmanas and so onbut that was not all his conversation was also peppered with references to classical and contemporary writers thinkers and artists of europe including especially those of france a country whose culture he admired to a point of adulation a citation of racine would follow one of rene char an allusion to pascal would follow one to camus one moment he would hail a work of braque and a few moments later recite a few lines from rilke one of his favourite poetsraza standing extreme right with other members of the bombay progressive artists group image delhi art galleryagain and again raza would also evoke memories of his childhood and youth before he set sail for france in 1950 seldom did he fail to mention the fear and fascination of the dark dense and mysterious forests of barbaria the village of his birth located on the banks of a tributary of the narmada river in madhya pradeshand then there was the evocation of the frenzied urban life of bombay where he studied at the j j school of arts and began his career as a painter in the company of m f husain f n souza v s gaitonde tyeb mehta akbar padamsee and many other aspiring artists who went on to make a mark on the international art scene decades later they bandied together to form the progressive artists group which spearheaded the movement of modern art in india a movement that accommodated huge differences of style and content but was at the same time driven by a singular ambition to free modern indian art from the twin pitfalls of oriental exotica and a shallow syncretism of indian subjects and european artistic formsnone of the above however should lead one to conclude that raza wallowed in nostalgia its debilitating seductions were alien to him throughout his stay abroad he made it a point to return to india over and over again to show his latest work connect with old friends discover new talents and above all to rediscover beneath the din and chaos of indian life the millenarian cultural and spiritual impulses of her people invigorated by these experiences he