Search results for: 'his name is darby and he's our hero'

A watercolourist par excellence known for his paintings on silk, Maniklal Banerjee was born in Borisal in present-day Bangladesh. He studied at Government College of Art in Calcutta and while still a student, became the first Indian artist to receive the Government of India’s scholarship for the arts. Learn More

Born in Margao, Goa, on 21 January 1926, Laxman Pai studied and later taught at Sir J. J. School of Art, Bombay. He participated in Mahatma Gandhi’s Satyagraha movement against the British rule that led to his imprisonment. Later, he participated in the movement to liberate Goa from centuries of Portuguese rule. Learn More

Forced to paint signboards at the age of eleven when his father died, Krishna Shamrao Kulkarni battled numerous early struggles to achieve a pre-eminent place in modern Indian art. Born in a village in Belgaum in Karnataka in 1916, Kulkarni engaged with modernist techniques and mediums to create a highly individuated pictorial language. Learn More

A founder member of the Progressive Artists’ Group, Hari Ambadas Gade was born in Amravati, Maharashtra, in 1917. In his own words, he had a ‘compelling interest in science and mathematics’, as a result of which he graduated in science. However, he started making landscapes while on a visit to Jabalpur; subsequently, S. H. Raza guided him on the nuances of landscape painting. Gade eventually obtained a masters from the Nagpur School of Art in 1950.

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A seminal and well-known contemporary Indian sculptor, Dhruva Mistry’s art, in his own words, is a ‘dialogue of an artist as a maker pursuing enigma of an omnipresent consciousness’. Learn More

Born in Lahore in British India, Dhanraj Bhagat acquired a diploma in sculpture from the city’s Mayo College of Art. He began working with clay while studying but it left him uninspired as he found little individuality in its amorphous nature. It was when he got his hands on wood with its uniquely tactile qualities that he felt inspired to carve and create. Learn More

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

This exhibition looks at landscape painting in India over a period of two hundred years, from 1780 to 1980. We start with English artists who travelled in India from the late eighteenth century onwards, to rediscover what they were looking for, and how they saw what they found. The introduction of new materials, and the teaching of new methods in the art schools from the middle of the 19th century, encouraged some Indian artists to adopt similar academic style approaches. In the twentieth century, a reaction set in, as Indian artists sought new modes of expression. As if reclaiming their patrimony and the right to represent it, they invented a glorious array of new landscape styles.

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Nine artists find special mention in India as ‘art treasures, having regard to their artistic and aesthetic value’, a directive by the Archaeological Survey of India in the 1970s. Spanning a period of one hundred years of art practice, these artists represent a diversity of art traditions and movements but are unified by one common thread: a return to Indian roots through context, theme, subject, and an engagement with identity.

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This exemplary themed exhibition at DAG’s booth at the India Art Fair 2018 was a masterclass in Indian art dedicated to the nine National Treasure artists. This declaration in the decade of the 1970s was intended to identify artists whose contribution had national significance. Even though the selection appears arbitrary and argumentative, the nine artists cannot be faulted for the quality of their work and the role they played in segueing the pre-independence freedom movement with their role and responsibility as artists. Nandalal Bose Sailoz Mookherjea Abanindranath Tagore Jamini Roy Amrita Sher-Gil Rabindranath Tagore Gagnendranath Tagore Nicholas Roerich Raja Ravi Varma

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Born in Meerut, Navjot Altaf studied fine and applied arts at Sir J. J. School of Art, Bombay, from 1967-72. A painter, sculptor, installation artist, and filmmaker inspired by Marxist ideologies, Navjot has consciously questioned various frameworks of social norms and created art to bring focus to the plight of the depressed classes. Learn More

Born in Bengal, Arup Das remains one of the most formidable muralists and painters of Indian modern art. He graduated from the Government College of Arts and Crafts Calcutta, in the 1940s. Later, in the 1960s, he became a member of All India Fine Arts and Crafts Society, New Delhi. Learn More