Untitled (Women Series) 1974

This untitled painting from Nalini Malani's "Women Series" presents a figure shrouded in profound emotional distress. The open mouth is a universal symbol of anguish, an echo of the wailing figures found in ancient Greek tragedies. We see this motif mirrored across cultures and eras, in Edvard Munch's "The Scream," where the open mouth becomes a conduit for existential terror. Here, Malani's figure internalizes this scream. Her face, contorted with grief, and her hands clasped tightly, reflect a deep sense of despair. In psychoanalytic terms, such gestures tap into the collective unconscious, resonating with primal fears and anxieties. This symbol has undergone a cyclical progression, resurfacing in various forms across history, each time colored by the specific anxieties of its age. Malani’s work becomes a site where the past and present converge, giving new voice to age-old suffering.