Govinda Sah ‘Azad’s paintings are informed by a combination of his inner habit of musing about the hidden nature of reality and his close attention to the details of his external physical surroundings. Composed of densely interwoven layers of mark-making, Sah’s canvases are created using oil and acrylic paints in what he describes as a ‘long unfolding conversation between artist and canvas.' His longstanding fascination with the indeterminate matter of clouds illuminated by natural light prompts him to meditate upon Nature’s spiritual aspects, which, in his native Nepal, meant studying the clouds that daily appeared and disappeared over the Himalayan mountains near to his home town of Rajbiraj, in Eastern Nepal. In local lore, these mountains were considered the realms of the Gods and were revered as sacred spaces. The encircling clouds were seen as veiling and revealing another world, which was the realm of these sacred presences.
In 2024, Sah had just completed a canvas called "Mountain to Margate" which explored his move from his home in mountainous Nepal to his current home by the sea in Margate, a place to which he was drawn because of J.M.W. Turner's fondness for the particular light and weather he often painted there. "Embracing Sky" begins as an exploration of the very different cloud formations that come in over the sea horizon towards the land, and in essence is a long meditation upon the fact that whereas in the mountains one must climb above the clouds to encounter the presence of the sacred, here, in Margate the sacred comes to meet us as a numinous presence arriving in the clouds that come from out at sea. While the interaction may feel quite different, even opposite, the experience of becoming one with nature and being caught up in the embrace of the clouds remains one and the same.