A year’s progress of art in India

Published in Modern Review, January 1942, pp. 72-73

When the war-god is astride and “lets slip the dogs of war,” the Arts and the cultural activities are the first causalities. Yet the destructive activities of war cannot entirely suspend the activities of artists. During the progress of the last

Review of the annual exhibition of the Academy of Fine Arts

The winter show of the Academy of Fine arts in Calcutta is a happy, hardy Annual, which, several weeks ahead, keeps busy three lively groups of our citizens, artists giving finishing touches to their pictures, lovers and connoisseurs of pictures looking out for new aesthetic thrills, and keen critics

In praise of painting

However much the products of pictorial art may be despised by learned men in India, today, - as “mere pictures”, - the Painters’ art had a respectable place in all the serious affairs of life - in all stages of India’s history. It was regarded as an amusement or a piece of sentimental luxury - but serious

The Value of Tradition in Art

The closing years of the last century have been marked with signs of change, (for better or worse who can tell?) in every department of human activity. In the realm of art this era of change has ushered into existence startlingly new conceptions: principles and ideals of aesthetics that had dominated

A So-Called Chinese Image of the Avoliketeswara

Searches for the many lost pages of the history of Indian art offer a very fascinating, though sometimes a very tantalising, occupation for the student. In the realm of painting, Indian art has recently yielded some quite interesting documents which have helped to fill up many gaping lacunae. The enormous

Problems of Modern Artists in India and China

I am grateful for the privilege extended to me to come and meet the members of this Fine Art Society and exchange views on questions of common interest to the artists of China and to the artists of India. You may well ask what qualification I have for this responsible task of discussing the vital problems

Gogonendra Nath Tagore: The Great Indian Artist

A century hence, it would not matter how many bales of jute or cotton crossed the Bay of Bengal, or how many seats were allocated in a Legislative Assembly to Mohamedans and how many to non-Mohamedans, but it would indeed matter, what records contemporary cultural life inscribed on the tablets of history.