Sayed Haider Raza's themes were drawn from his childhood memories spent in the forests of his native village of Babaria, in Madhya Pradesh. Raza's style evolved over the years - he began with expressionist landscapes, which became rigid, geometric representations of French towns and villages in the early 1950s, following his move to Paris. Later, the lines blurred and colour began to dominate; his theme was still landscape but it was now non-representational, speaking to the sentiment evoked by a place rather than its tangible aspects.

In the late 1970s, the artist's focus turned to pure geometrical forms; his images were improvisations on an essential theme: that of the mapping out of a metaphorical space in the mind. In the 1980s, the circle or "Bindu" became the central motif. Sacred in its symbolism, it placed his work in an Indian context.

The artist calls his work from the 1980s onwards a "result of two parallel enquiries." Firstly, it is aimed at a "pure plastic order" and secondly, it concerns the theme of nature. Both converge into a single point and become inseparable - the "Bindu" (the dot or the epicentre). "The Bindu symbolizes the seed, bearing the potential of all life."