Krishen Khanna (b.1925)

Mapin Publishing, Krishen Khanna: Images in My Time, Ahmedabad, 2007, p. 13 illus.

Krishen Khanna was born in Faisalabad, Pakistan, and grew up in Lahore. Following Partition in 1947, Khanna's family moved to Simla and this displacement had a profound impact on his work. He was deeply affected by the change in his personal circumstances and the socio-political chaos that it brought to bear. Khanna went on to depict significant occasions in history that were full of violence, subjugation and tyranny.

Titled Flagellation, this painting is from Khanna’s series of works on biblical subjects. The artist interprets a scene from the story of Christ in which Christ is blindfolded and whipped by the Romans before his crucifixion. As apparent in this painting, Khanna applied these biblical references within an Indian context, and their religious symbolism becomes a social concern.

Throughout his career Khanna has returned to the theme of the persecution of Christ which he uses as a metaphor for the suffering of the everyday man. The inspiration for the Christ theme came to him whilst driving with his father up to Simla. Along the way they stopped at a dhaba for tea when Kahan Chand remarked that any of the waiters at the cafe could be a Christ figure. The physique of the figure with his sun darkened body and wizened callous face are akin to those of the labourers that Khanna and his father saw.

Norbert Lynton notes that in this series, Khanna’s figures “are presented starkly, in an almost monochrome composition, the assailant clad in white and standing over a brown-skinned Christ, blindfolded, crouching and bound tightly with white bands so that the brown of his body and the zig-zagging bands are the painting’s main visual motif, together with that central hand pulling so viciously at Christ’s hair. Khanna has witnessed or known of, over the decades, many fellow humans suffering at the hands of officials acting on the orders of superior powers. Flagellation stands for such acts of violence, often for political reasons but supposedly in the name of law and order” (N. Lynton, ‘The Betrayal and the Flagellation’, Krishen Khanna: Images in My Time, Mapin Publishing, Ahmedabad, 2007, p. 20)

This moving and emotional painting is executed with a stark chiaroscuro effect so that the dark skin of the Christ figure contrasts with the cream bandages and white robes of the persecutor. Imbued with a mastery of light and tonality, this work is arguably one of Krishen Khanna's finest compositions.  As seen in this work, Khanna’s mastery of the symbolic figure reaches even greater heights in his depiction of one of religious history’s most important characters.