The present painting, one of the latest works of Jafar Rouhbakhsh, is exploiting an abstract form as well as potentials of line to express the profound feelings of the artist.
Rouhbakhsh, who has all his life been fascinated by Oriental art and Iranian leitmotifs, is using colors that resurrect traditional glass painting. The dark expanse of the canvas coupled with his knowledge of colors creates a fluidity that embodies a moment of brilliance. Intertwining lines wallow in a stretch of dazzling colors, and keep disappearing on the deep dark surface. In such a dynamic visualization, Rouhbakhsh is promising his audience a journey to a fancy world where a cosmic space is behind each color and line, as if the canvas is a window to another world, a world of ever existing vibrations which is a popular notion in the East.
Making use of Iranian indigenous, traditional patterns, Rouhbakhsh is taking refuge in twisting lines that are reminders of Persian calligraphy in this painting. It seems as if in a trance-like state, Rouhbakhsh is intuitively creating an eternal hymn that could go on forever. The undulating composition that is created by the brushstrokes gives life to a kind of visual music.
His greatest artistic achievements include formal purism, achieving a personal style in abstract art, and creating obscure, allegoric settings. Bustling lines with masses of energy constantly change form and present an aspect of existence that is in contrast with non-existence. The darkness of the surface is disrupted by colorful and transparent lines to form a hyperactive space in the center of the picture. A thorough understanding of space as well as an attention to detail, along with rhythmic, solid pattern has enabled the artist to give the work a unique quality.
Rouhbakhsh is admiringly in control of colors in this painting. An attention to lines, especially fine lines, is his usual concern. This can be traced in the teachings of Hossein Behzad. These free-moving, twisting lines along with an interactive play of light and shadow, constitute the foundations of a unique perspective in his work which, with the application of azure, purple, and turquoise, can indicate an intuitive, philosophical experimentation with Oriental metaphysical painting.
Although Rouhbakhsh is known to be an abstract artist, the application of certain fluid lines and the development of a certain style in inducing perspective makes this particular painting one of the artist’s most unique works of the third chapter of his career which is rare among his works.
A similar work by the artist was sold for $133,000 at the Christie’s auction in 2008.
