# 602, Oil on canvas, 36 x 36 inches, Late 1970s

S YOUSUF ALI - painter beyond excellence, simpleton, friend, enigma till the end!

I cannot begin writing about Yousuf Ali without saying that he was, to my mind, one of the greatest painters the world should have known! If I became, over the years, one of his closest friends, it was because of our mutual and extreme sensitivity to art along with a sense of humility and righteousness that both of us embraced.

There was a time when both of us pursued a career in the advertising profession - in the same advertising agency. I had great admiration for him as a gifted visualiser and he seemed to like the concepts and copy I wrote for promotion of products. Our appreciation for each other grew and we were paired together for quite a few campaigns as well as proposals for new accounts. But beyond that successful teaming up in a professional sense, there was little else that brought us together - until, at the peak of his career, when he chose to throw graphics arts out of the window and return to his first love, fine art!

Yousuf (as I had always called him) was, in his earlier years, a student of Fine Arts at the J.J. School of Art. He seldom talked about his years of education. All that he would say was, "After I passed out, I desperately needed a job. An ad agency needed an artist and although I was not qualified in graphic arts, I applied. I was taken in - as an illustrator!" Gifted as he was, it did not take him long not only to learn but even to master the basics of graphic arts - strong sense of composition, typography and use of masses for striking visuals. He soon joined another agency in the 1960s, as a junior visualiser.

Newspapers were not printed in colour during those days and Yousuf used black most effectively for attracting attention to the advertisements he visualised. His strength as a fine illustrator added to the uniqueness of his visuals. He could sketch almost anything; right from a human figure to a product (engineering or consumer item) and one would never feel the lack of not having used an actual photograph in the visual. The strokes of his sketches had remarkable strength and he varied them so beautifully according to the product that was being promoted. I realised all this when I joined the same agency he worked for, as a trainee Account Executive. Later, when I also became a part of the creative team for the accounts I serviced, I had the privilege of being closer, as it were, to Yousuf's drawing board - there were no computers then. He would begin conceiving the layout on sheets of regular tracing paper, sketching with a soft, thick pencil lead. He would say "You know, artists do not understand the feel of sketching on tracing paper with a soft pencil - it's different -they have never tried it - that rough "feel" enhances what you do, if you have a good hand - I hope you understand what I mean." When I tried it myself, more out of curiosity, I thought it made a tremendous difference! But I could not but accept the fact that Yousuf's hand was different, God-given, blessed and rare!

# 603, Water colour on paper, 13.5 x 10.5 inches, Late 1980s

Yousuf was quite dark and tall, large of frame and gained weight during his more prosperous days as a fine artist. He dressed very simply, always wore chappals and carried a small leather pouch which served him to hold his extra packet of "paan" or at times, a hefty packet of notes that he would have just collected from one of his art dealers at Warden Road! I had set up an agency of my own in the same locality and it was here that Yousuf and I would often meet and talk of things of the past and present.

There was an unbelievable casualness about his whole demeanor and I often wondered whether anybody at all would attribute to him the great talent he possessed! There were others in his class who would deliberately pose, dress and talk in an arty and "calculated" way, all set to attract attention. Not so with Yousuf - he was and looked ordinary and talked of ordinary things with strangers. He seldom talked about his paintings other than when I chose to talk about it. Nor was he interested in comparing his style with those of others even when I commented discreditably about some of his contemporaries. He was an artist in the true sense and believed in art for art's sake.

There are a couple of interesting stories I know about how sinfully unmindful he was even when others chose to copy his style. Whenever he visited me, he always used to open my office door, stand silently for a few moments as though to make his huge presence felt and then walk towards my table. On one such occasion, when he came to my office, he seemed very excited and started talking even as he approached me. He spoke to me with a big smile on his face, eagerly and with great "joy"! I could not understand what could excite him so much for he kept insisting and repeating that I must visit an art gallery in town to see an exhibition of paintings by some relatively unknown artist. For some reason, Yousuf always felt that I appreciated his paintings best and was best qualified to assess his works! I would not say that was far from the truth for I had always been his greatest admirer! He simply refused to disclose why it was necessary for me to visit that gallery. Finally when I did visit the gallery a couple of days later, I was aghast at the thought that someone could dare to make a miserable imitation of his style and subjects with total disregard to anatomy and composition. That night, we had a long chat over the telephone for almost an hour. Although I was extremely distressed and angry, he seemed to treat the whole issue too casually - "What does it matter, people who know art will understand. They will not buy from him. Let him sell to his people. He needs to make a living too!"

# 604, Water colour on paper, 13.5 x 10.25 inches, Late 1980s

Another instance. This time, I had seen a fairly large photograph of the interior of a restaurant in Mumbai in one of the supplements of a daily newspaper and I was a little shocked to see what I thought was an imitation of a couple of Yousuf's paintings, all of which I was quite familiar with. Even in that small size of the proportionately reproduced version on the wall, I could easily tell it was a cheap imitation. I called Yousuf and told him all about it, despising the bad, growing trend. I insisted he should go to the restaurant, speak to the manager and do something about it. A few days later, he dropped in at my office. I was eager to know what had happened. He said he had been to the restaurant, seen the paintings, had dinner and walked out! His immediate remark was that the dinner was good! "What about the paintings, Yousuf?" I asked in confused frustration. His reply in Hindi was, "Yaar, maine dekha, sab gadbad hai. Jaane do yaar, apne ko kya karna hai!" ("I saw them, my friend, it's all a mess. Let it be my friend, why should we bother about it!") I guess his remark was not only typical of his humility but also a quiet self-realisation that God had put him on a level from where he was required to pardon and think kindly of others. I realised then not only what a wonderful human being he was but also the priceless talent God had invested in him.

Though a devout Muslim, Yousuf was never narrowly focused on religion. If I recall rightly, one of his very first large horizontal canvases featured a fairly sizeable image of Lord Ganesh. He specially called me to his residence one day to seek my opinion on this work. I frankly felt he was just getting into his element and developing a style that would, in course of time, become unique and masterly. Shockingly, it took him only a short time to take that "flight"! A senior PR executive of one of our agency's clients, realising his potential as a fine artist, made him an offer with a commercial understanding. God bless him. He was influential and motivated Yousuf to leave the advertising profession and take to fine art as a full time activity. His first exhibition at the Taj was a great success! From the two or three paintings left behind, he gifted one of them to me. I was touched!

Most of his paintings for the first couple of exhibitions were titled after "ragas" of Indian classical music for two reasons-- both Yousuf and the PRO who promoted him, were fond of Indian classical music and coincidentally, almost all of Yousuf's canvases were based initially on Indian musicians and instrumentalists. The commercial arrangement he had with the PRO soon fell through and Yousuf decided to pursue his journey all by himself during the seventies. That was a good decision for he felt constricted by the standard themes he was influenced to adopt to make his works commercial viable. He soon saw the fallacy of titling paintings with the names of Indian "ragas" without much justification. He gave me the privilege of titling most of his canvases thereafter. Quite a few of them were on different subjects but music and man-woman relationship predominated.

# 1379, Oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches, 1970

I have very fond memories of the titling "procedure" adopted each time before an exhibition was held at the Taj Art gallery. I was always forced to take leave from my work for a whole day and visit his residence to view all the paintings he had readied for the exhibition. His canvas frames were simple black wooden "pattis" he would paint and fix himself. Many a time he would do this in front of me while I concentrated on some other painting, searching for words that would most aptly describe the mood of the picture. Again, it was a matter of his utter humility that he would do this carpentry work in my presence! These things never bothered him.

It was always the inner small room he would lock me in with specific, strong instructions to his dear wife and two children (Nicky and Hamza who are now adorably grown up and married), not to disturb me or tap the door for passing through to the front or back room. I knew it was punishment for them and though I insisted all this mattered little to me, he was adamant. He would give me an easy chair and ask me if I were comfortable and whether I was in need of anything else. With all this, I often felt Yousuf had the feeling that the title was equally as important as the painting itself -- I used to frankly disagree with him and he used to be upset. Fearing that he may think I was taking things a little too casually, I would put in extra effort if nothing else to justify all that he felt for me! Sometimes, at the end of the day, three or four paintings used to be left behind for titling. I had to commit them to my memory in terms of subject, form and colour scheme and then convey the titles the next day over the telephone. I remember I used to repeat the words quite a few times over the telephone to ensure there was no spelling error. He used to thank me profusely and I always felt quite embarrassed! My sittings at his house for this special purpose was accompanied by rounds of tea , sherbet and snacks, the afternoon meal being a rich, double omelette with "parathas" since he knew I avoided formal meals at that time. I invariably wondered and never understood why my friend had so much respect for what I did. Was this a bond of some previous birth, a privilege I had to accept with grace? There was, of course, little doubt I simply adored him for what he did.

# 1612, Water colour on paper, 12 x 13.75 inches, 1983

Yousuf's exhibitions at the Taj were always a commercial success with hardly a painting or two being left behind and which he then diverted to his dealers. There was an instance or two when all his paintings were sold out, a very rare commercial happening indeed! He mentioned to me once that some German buyer was so fascinated by his work that he insisted he would make him a world-renowned painter if only he could leave his family and house and accompany him to Germany by the next flight! I chastised him for not having availed of the opportunity but he said he would never want to leave his parents or his family like that. I told him jokingly, "No, your problem is not that - you need a place where you can start painting after midnight and then sleep from seven in the morning till midday!" He laughed. Yousuf had a fetish for painting only after midnight. He never could do it during the day-- partly because of the quiet and peace he experienced at that time, considering the kind of neighbourhood in which he lived. I always used to make fun of him saying he was actually getting his work done through somebody else at that unearthly hour and which he did not want others to know! He used to say, "Ha yaar, such tho wohi hai!" (Yes friend, that is the truth!) Much as I and more keenly my daughter, were eager to see him paint and learn from him, that good fortune was not to be owing to his unusual and difficult time schedule.

Among his small circle of friends, were two other fond admirers, Daljit Singh Sethi and Ravi Dauriya. Daljit (who later founded Aura Art) gave Yousuf all the moral support and motivation. At one point, realising his love and selfless promotion of art, Yousuf was in serious consultation with him for setting up an art gallery in Mumbai. But Ravi, a one-time advertising studio owner who left Mumbai to set up shop in Muscat, succeeded in making Yousuf do what I thought he would never do! After much persuasion and coercion, Ravi succeeded in getting Yousuf across to Muscat for an exhibition! This was another instance when Yousuf, by a slim chance, missed out on world fame.

I am not quite aware nor do I recall how successful the exhibition was but he did get a good coverage in the premier English daily of the Middle East. Strangely, Yousuf always trusted me to write about his work and what was published in the daily was almost identical to the write-up I equipped him with before he left for Muscat. But what he missed out is yet another regrettable story.

Dame Tempra, one of the world's renowned art lovers and auctioneers, was then residing at a hotel in Muscat. Although attempts were made to seek a meeting with her, she probably had little time to entertain artists who were relatively unknown and of lesser repute. However, she obliged to have a look at Yousuf's works and asked him to leave the canvases at the reception desk of the hotel and have them fetched the next day. What Yousuf left at the reception for her valued assessment, was a mere roll of unmounted, painted canvases. What he fetched the next day from the desk was the same roll with a personal, brief, handwritten note from Dame Tempra. It was the best certificate he could have received! She wrote briefly and yet decisively --that his paintings needed to be exhibited in the biggest art shows of the world! Her appreciation and views matched mine and I was thrilled when he showed me the letter. I have often wondered after that "happening", what fate would have had in store for him if only he had insisted upon the privilege of a meeting with her, sought her advice and appealed to her for help! Yousuf was content though with her letter - he never sought to communicate with her after that.

Yousuf's last show at the Taj was phenomenal and stunning. I thought it was the peak of his artistic brilliance. Now I feel it was the kind of brilliance one sees in the last glow of the candle before it totally melts down! There were four paintings I vividly recall, two of them very large and vertical in format while the other two were much smaller square formats. One of the larger ones featured a typical and marvelous pose of an Oddissi dancer. It was amazing to see how well he captured the typical slant and angles of the hip, upper torso, shoulders, neck and head! (I was a classical dancer in my younger days and am quite sensitive to what is incorrect.) From a distance, one admired the utter softness of the flowers worn on the head of the dancer in striking contrast to the sharp cuts of the heavy, gleaming, golden metal girdle. And yet, on closer view, all that one could see were mere dabs of paint! It seemed as though he worked on the canvas in a trance, just imagining in the back of his mind what the effect should be while his hand moved and did what it had to do without his being conscious of it!

The other large painting was that of a village father carrying on his shoulders, his little son holding balloons - a typical scene from a village fair. There was little need for anyone to tell the father was poor. His bare torso exposed ribs that were anatomically perfect in their rendition. The straight, erect posture was visually supported by a heavy straight staff he held in his right hand. How I admired, in all his paintings, the correctness of the placement of fingers of the hand! The painting conveyed it all - pride and joy in poverty!

The two smaller formats were totally different in themes and displayed Yousuf's absolute versatility in capturing the essence of his varied subjects so vividly while being consistent in his style. One of them featured a typical scene of two village women sitting on their haunches and gossiping. Yousuf hailed from Vengurla, a coastal village near Goa. He often reminisced about the quietness of the place and the fishing activity. I strongly feel, both the suppleness and the strength of the female figures in his canvases stemmed from the sights he was exposed to in the fishing village. Particularly, those beautiful poses of women bunching up their hair at the back of the head and the easy style of the knot were typical of village simplicity and charm!

# 426, Water colour on paper, 14 x 10 inches

The two women in this canvas wore big metal anklets and again I admired the lustre he captured in the metal and the angle in which it rested on their feet - absolute accuracy! It was one of my favourites and I wonder now why I did not have the heart or the courage of friendship to ask him to gift the painting to me! I knew without doubt he would have gifted that painting to me most happily and willingly had I only mentioned it to him. I regret that now, very badly.

Another of my favourites in that exhibition was his other small painting on a pair of galloping horses, as viewed from the back. The angle and representation was stunningly accurate in terms of anatomy - the enlarged rumps with wildly swishing tails, barely visible bodies and heads in a much smaller size, visible at the far end. That unusual angle, to say the least, was photographically accurate.

I feel sure the Almighty is still holding back a mysterious plan behind Yousuf's untimely and premature demise in 1997. After his last exhibition, his health deteriorated very badly and when I met him last, I could feel the bones on his back as I hugged him! His lungs were infected. His last journey was as simple and ordinary as the many others he had undertaken when he lived - he mostly travelled by bus in the city unless he was required to transport his canvases. Relatives and friends gathered close to grant him a handful of earth as his coffin was lowered to rest in a pit. All was over. And yet as I think of that day even now, my heart screams and says, "No, it is not over - his life-canvas is unfinished!" There is little doubt his paintings live now and that there is more to happen, a lot more indeed!
I started writing about Yousuf by saying that he was one of the greatest artists the world should have known. I need to justify that statement now. He was truly versatile - he could turn his hand to any kind of painting, media and subjects - from realistic portraits, nudes, flowers, birds and animals to brilliant product and machine illustrations, architectural facades, advertising graphics and abstracts - all with equal flair and ease - all with absolute accuracy of anatomy, construction and form. He once painted a palace as seen through a window with leaves and flowers around the frame of the window. I took a photograph and showed the print to my daughter. Without any hesitation she believed it was a photograph of an actual palace as seen through a window!


He was comfortable with any medium of painting. I would say he trained each medium to obey his hand! He "mastered" them all - pencil, charcoal, crayon, oils, water and poster colours, even coloured inks. He developed a most unique style in this last medium of coloured inks. It is a mystery how he controlled the flow of such a dangerously watery and potent medium on paper. He would make different colours of inks flow into each other on paper and create middle shades and patches. At the same time, he would be careful enough to safeguard the white of the paper wherever pure whites were required. His technique, even as he patiently explained it to me, was uncanny and difficult to perceive. I never had the good fortune to see him do it though. He would then draw thin outlines in black with an ink pen for each patch. The inter-weaving maze of black lines defined the forms and rendered the final picture. He was once commissioned by the Maharaja of Baroda for a series of paintings in this uncanny style, on the theme of Indian gods and goddesses. He was so careful about the colours he chose for different subjects, that he once painted a picture in this style in different shades of brown for one of my promotional folders for a heavy engineering product! Among my prized possessions are three such paintings he specially created for me in this medium, each one a masterpiece and each so accurately portrayed! Knowing I was formally trained in Kathakali in my young days, he chose that subject and painted three different and typically characteristic poses of a Kathakali dancer. It is unbelievable how he captured the typical stance and spirit of the dancer, the elaborate costume and ornamentation in that difficult medium of coloured inks. There is one with a large traditional South Indian brass lamp in the forefront - the typical flame, shape and proportion of the lamp need to be known to be admired!

# 1611, Poster colours on card, 17.5 x 11 inches

There is still no artist who can come anywhere close to duplicating Yousuf's unique style of oil on canvas. Many reasons. It is extremely difficult to visualise the manner, positioning and extent of segmentation of the area of his painted canvases. The strength, power and candidness of his dividing lines (the canvas being stripped of its paint by the back of his brush or the palette knife) indicate a divine "ferocity" and urgency that none have been blessed with so far. It was not planned, not pre-conceived. He may as well have been blindfolded at that time and those "beautifully vicious" lines would have still "happened" - or so, one feels! The few who have attempted have messed up with too many divisions or dividing strokes in the wrong place - all too miserably contrived.

Yousuf's understanding of anatomy, be it human or animal, was unquestionable. I have often said that only those who are adept at realistic painting have the licence to distort. Yousuf's licence to distort was permanent and needed no renewal! The heads of his figures were always small, breasts of women were passionately exaggerated, navels and nipples were sun formations with small "rays", fingers were invariably extra long and large ankles and toes "emerged" out from the sitting postures of his subjects with anatomical accuracy. But the whole figure always seemed well balanced and never hurt the viewer's eye. There was certainly a mysterious beauty in his style of distortion - the kind of beauty that can only come with perfect understanding of anatomy. The poses of his human figures (also animals) were rendered with almost photographic accuracy. The positioning of those extra long fingers of the hand, whether it was for playing an instrument or holding a staff or bunching the hair at the back of a woman's head, was depicted with such great accuracy and beauty! Yousuf always maintained that realistic art was indeed not only true art but the most difficult and challenging of all. I always respected his statement and wondered how level-headed and true he was to himself even at the peak of his short career as a modern artist.

Yousuf's colour schemes had a child-like charm. He would use the brightest of reds, almost fluorescent greens or even pure whites and offset them with muted colours. Few would dare to use colours of such brightness and yet know the way to make it seem right, acceptable and professional. In sharp contrast, there were other canvases where he preferred almost monochromatic tones.

It may seem a bit complex to say that Yousuf had mastered his own self, not to have definite, set choices! But that is the truth. Given his chosen, unique style of painting, he travelled widely and freely in terms of subjects and colour schemes, within that boundary. I would attribute such joyous freedom only to his mastery of anatomy and form -- and an eye that was no less than God's own eye!


Satish Pillai
(I am indeed indebted to Shri Daljit Singh Sethi for publishing this book in honour of the great legend - a tribute Yousuf richly deserves and which I always looked forward to, since there has been no organized record of his works so far)