Search results for: 'Early Bengal Oils DAG'

Chittaprosad Bhattacharya (1913-1978) was a versatile artist and a lifelong adherent of the socialistic worldview. In 1943, he traveled across the famine-stricken villages of Bengal and produced realistic sketches of human suffering that were regularly published in the pages of the Communist Party journal 'People’s war'. These sketches were later compiled and published as a booklet under the title 'Hungry Bengal'. Fascinated by his artistic skills, the General Secretary of Communist Party of India, Puran Chand Joshi took Chittaprosad to the Party’s headquarters in Bombay (now Mumbai). 

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Jamini Roy’s was an art of quiet resistance that assimilated so seamlessly into the folk and craft traditions of Bengal that it did not cause any discernible ripples among the prevalent artistic mood. All around him, art was being nurtured, questioned, uprooted—it was, after all, a period when nationalist feelings ran high and a search for an indigenous lexicon was paramount—but Jaminida’s ability to look to tradition for a modern approach, though revolutionary, was instinctively natural and organic. It was art that everyone understood and wanted to take home. No wonder Jamini babu became a household name in his native Calcutta and went on to be honoured as one of the pre-eminent National Treasure artists of the country whose art has the greatest acceptance of any known Indian modernist.

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Born in present-day Bangladesh, Amalnath Chakladhar belongs to that category of Bengali modernists who carved an identity uniquely their own, despite the overarching influence of the three prominent strains of modern art in Bengal in the first half of the twentieth century—the Bengal School, academic training in art schools of Calcutta, and expressionism in Santiniketan. His contribution to furthering modernism in India, therefore, assumes importance for being a seminal, individual effort. Learn More

G. R. Santosh created a hugely accomplished career without formal training in art. His abstract paintings made in the early 1960s had Kashmir as his muse, and often used encaustic and beeswax—a process he learned from Shanti Dave. Architect and designer Pinakin Patel shares his views about In the Snows of Kashmir, Santosh’s masterful painting with textural relief in a monochrome palette.

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This Untitled painting, created in the early-to-mid-1970s, reflects Shanti Dave's fervent experimentation during a prolific period marked by international recognition in mural making and exhibitions. Drawing inspiration from childhood memories of Badapura and nearby archaeological ruins, the abstract composition blends colour pigments, beeswax, and oil solutions in a dynamic interplay. Employing a reverse image technique with molten wax, the painting challenges perceptions and invites contemplation on the nature of truth. Noted fashion designer and art-collector Tarun Tahiliani explains the nuances of Shanti Dave’s work in a film specially created on the painting.

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The exhibition presents views of the ancient city of Benares (now Varanasi) as depicted by foreign artists in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. 

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A workshop on typography and the art of font-making, facilitated by Diptanshu Roy, Creative Director (Wunderman Thompson) and Musician, inspired by the poster art of early 20th century.

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Chittaprosad couldn’t have created a more germane work in honour of the people who successfully fought their oppressors to create an independent nation. A close examination of his masterpiece, Bangladesh War, reveals the artist’s use of symbols of hope against persecution and domination, art collector and philanthropist Nadia Samdani tells us.

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The medieval ages saw the rise in India and parts of Asia of philosophical, theological, cultural, literary and visual manifestations that derived from diverse faiths but with one aim—to attain enlightened liberation. Its resistance to Brahmanical texts and hegemony resulted in the creation of geometrical aesthetics that were interpreted by way of texts, paintings, and architecture and had a monumental impact on society. At the centre of its geometric configurations—the triangle, the square, and the circle—lay the idea of Creation itself, the source of primal energy that could to be diverted towards a higher consciousness, and all universe was manifest in this. Learn More

The DAG Archive has over 90,000 photographs taken by Nemai Ghosh, a bulk of which includes still photographs and behind the scenes images of films as well as candid and staged portraits of Satyajit Ray. In conjunction to these materials, DAG Archive has also acquired a set of two notebooks of Ray which contains the hand-written film scripts of <i>Ghare Baire</I> (The Home and The World, 1984) and Samapti (The Conclusion) which is one of the short films from the anthology, Teen Kanya (Three Women, 1961). Interestingly, both these films are adaptations from Rabindranath Tagore’s literary works.

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Get a glimpse of Madhvi Parekh as she talks about her practice and the relevance of festivals and celebrations in her art.

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