An institutional Photograph on the occasion of Dhurandhar officiating as the Director of J. J. School
Silver gelatin print on paper, 1930
7.4 X 10.6 in. / 18.8 X 26.9 cm.
Collection: DAG
TEA PARTIES
Tea parties and ceremonies were regularly held in the School, highlighting its role as a site where colonial administrators, educators, students and their families could meet and interact. Since the 1890s, Indian students had been regularly hired to teach, indicating their increasing influence within the institution. Although these events were generally joyful, some diary entries decry the overt stiffness of some occasions or note particularly emotional farewells, such as the teary-eyed departure of Principal John Griffiths.
Pestonji Bomanji
Self-Potrait
Oil on canvas pasted on wood, 1914
20.0 X 16.0 in. / 50.8 X 40.6 cm.
Registered work (non-exportable)
Collection: DAG
THE PEOPLE OF JJ
The portrait studies made by students and faculty at the School often included relatives, friends, anonymous models and self-portraits. Pithawalla drew his mother; A. X. Trindade painted his wife, Florentina, in several works that experimented radically with her pose; and A. A. Bhonsale painted his influential teacher, Gladstone Solomon, towards the end of his tenure at the School in 1936. V. A. Mali’s portrait of the filmmaker and artist Baburao Painter, and Dhurandhar’s portrait of the influential actor Bal Gandharva, also suggests the influence of the world of theatre and cinema at the School.
Unidentified photographer
M. V. Dhurandhar, Ambika Dhurandhar and Gangubai with students of J. J. School of Art during a study tour
Silver gelatin print on paper, 1928
5.1 X 8.0 in. / 13.0 X 20.3 cm.
Collection: DAG
THROUGH THE EYES OF AMBIKA DHURANDHAR
Ambika Dhurandhar, who lived with her father at Amba Sadan in Khar, later renamed Dhurandhar Kala Mandir, and Angela Trindade, were some of the earliest women graduates from the School. Both were daughters of faculty members and became key figures in promoting the School’s academic artistic style and cementing the legacies of their fathers. Privy to his networks, locations and associations from a young age, Ambika’s work showcases her keen observational skills, capturing mythic or everyday scenes that extended beyond the traditional academic confines of the studio.
Unidentified photographer
An institutional Photograph on the occasion of Dhurandhar officiating as the Director of J. J. School
Silver gelatin print on paper, 1930
7.4 X 10.6 in. / 18.8 X 26.9 cm.
Collection: DAG
TEA PARTIES
Tea parties and ceremonies were regularly held in the School, highlighting its role as a site where colonial administrators, educators, students and their families could meet and interact. Since the 1890s, Indian students had been regularly hired to teach, indicating their increasing influence within the institution. Although these events were generally joyful, some diary entries decry the overt stiffness of some occasions or note particularly emotional farewells, such as the teary-eyed departure of Principal John Griffiths.
Pestonji Bomanji
Self-Potrait
Oil on canvas pasted on wood, 1914
20.0 X 16.0 in. / 50.8 X 40.6 cm.
Registered work (non-exportable)
Collection: DAG
THE PEOPLE OF JJ
The portrait studies made by students and faculty at the School often included relatives, friends, anonymous models and self-portraits. Pithawalla drew his mother; A. X. Trindade painted his wife, Florentina, in several works that experimented radically with her pose; and A. A. Bhonsale painted his influential teacher, Gladstone Solomon, towards the end of his tenure at the School in 1936. V. A. Mali’s portrait of the filmmaker and artist Baburao Painter, and Dhurandhar’s portrait of the influential actor Bal Gandharva, also suggests the influence of the world of theatre and cinema at the School.
Unidentified photographer
M. V. Dhurandhar, Ambika Dhurandhar and Gangubai with students of J. J. School of Art during a study tour
Silver gelatin print on paper, 1928
5.1 X 8.0 in. / 13.0 X 20.3 cm.
Collection: DAG
THROUGH THE EYES OF AMBIKA DHURANDHAR
Ambika Dhurandhar, who lived with her father at Amba Sadan in Khar, later renamed Dhurandhar Kala Mandir, and Angela Trindade, were some of the earliest women graduates from the School. Both were daughters of faculty members and became key figures in promoting the School’s academic artistic style and cementing the legacies of their fathers. Privy to his networks, locations and associations from a young age, Ambika’s work showcases her keen observational skills, capturing mythic or everyday scenes that extended beyond the traditional academic confines of the studio.
Unidentified photographer
An institutional Photograph on the occasion of Dhurandhar officiating as the Director of J. J. School
Silver gelatin print on paper, 1930
7.4 X 10.6 in. / 18.8 X 26.9 cm.
Collection: DAG
TEA PARTIES
Tea parties and ceremonies were regularly held in the School, highlighting its role as a site where colonial administrators, educators, students and their families could meet and interact. Since the 1890s, Indian students had been regularly hired to teach, indicating their increasing influence within the institution. Although these events were generally joyful, some diary entries decry the overt stiffness of some occasions or note particularly emotional farewells, such as the teary-eyed departure of Principal John Griffiths.
Pestonji Bomanji
Self-Potrait
Oil on canvas pasted on wood, 1914
20.0 X 16.0 in. / 50.8 X 40.6 cm.
Registered work (non-exportable)
Collection: DAG
THE PEOPLE OF JJ
The portrait studies made by students and faculty at the School often included relatives, friends, anonymous models and self-portraits. Pithawalla drew his mother; A. X. Trindade painted his wife, Florentina, in several works that experimented radically with her pose; and A. A. Bhonsale painted his influential teacher, Gladstone Solomon, towards the end of his tenure at the School in 1936. V. A. Mali’s portrait of the filmmaker and artist Baburao Painter, and Dhurandhar’s portrait of the influential actor Bal Gandharva, also suggests the influence of the world of theatre and cinema at the School.
Unidentified photographer
M. V. Dhurandhar, Ambika Dhurandhar and Gangubai with students of J. J. School of Art during a study tour
Silver gelatin print on paper, 1928
5.1 X 8.0 in. / 13.0 X 20.3 cm.
Collection: DAG
THROUGH THE EYES OF AMBIKA DHURANDHAR
Ambika Dhurandhar, who lived with her father at Amba Sadan in Khar, later renamed Dhurandhar Kala Mandir, and Angela Trindade, were some of the earliest women graduates from the School. Both were daughters of faculty members and became key figures in promoting the School’s academic artistic style and cementing the legacies of their fathers. Privy to his networks, locations and associations from a young age, Ambika’s work showcases her keen observational skills, capturing mythic or everyday scenes that extended beyond the traditional academic confines of the studio.
Walter Langhammer
Portrait of a Woman at a Spinning Wheel
Oil on canvas
22.5 X 28.0 in. / 57.2 X 71.1 cm.
Collection: DAG
CRITICAL FRAMINGS
In the work of artists such as K.K. Hebbar and P.T. Reddy, a founder member of the ‘Young Turks’, one can see an evolution of style informed by debates that were central to the School’s functioning in the 1930s. Their search for cultural authenticity would also pick up on the abstractions of style that were becoming equally entrenched by then, due to the critical efforts of Walter Langhammer—a European émigré with political sympathy towards the nationalist movement who introduced expressionistic works and modernist aesthetics from the West to Indian students—and prolific art critic S. A. Krishnan, among others.
Charles Gerrard
The Young Musician
Plate from Exhibition Catalogue of Contemporary Indian Art curated by Charles Gerrard featuring leading contemporary young artists from Bombay (1942)
Collection: DAG
'CONTEMPORARY INDIAN ART’
Student and teacher-led exhibitions at the School started featuring the works of the ‘Young Turks’ Group—also known as the ‘Bombay Contemporary India Artists’. An important show was held against the backdrop of the Second World War, where Charles Gerrard highlighted the importance of Indian art’s attempt to claim the unbroken line of traditional art in the country, which was fostering, ‘as a result of much experiment’, a new contemporary Indian art outlook amongst his students. The miniature style work that he included in the show departed from his usual expressionistic style.
V. S. Adurkar
Untitled
Etching and aquatint on paper
Print size: 12.2 X 6.5 in. / 31.0 X 16.5 cm.
Paper size: 14.2 X 10.5 in. / 36.1 X 26.7 cm.
Collection: DAG
CHANGING OF THE GUARD
J. M. Ahivasi and Nagarkar were the leading exponents of Indian painting, which was encouraged by Solomon, while V. S. Adurkar would become the first Indian director of the School after India’s Independence. His journey, transitioning from a traditional artisanal community—where his caste was tied to a specific profession—to a studio artist working in a completely different professional sphere, highlights the evolution of the School and its educational goals since its inception.
Walter Langhammer
Portrait of a Woman at a Spinning Wheel
Oil on canvas
22.5 X 28.0 in. / 57.2 X 71.1 cm.
Collection: DAG
CRITICAL FRAMINGS
In the work of artists such as K.K. Hebbar and P.T. Reddy, a founder member of the ‘Young Turks’, one can see an evolution of style informed by debates that were central to the School’s functioning in the 1930s. Their search for cultural authenticity would also pick up on the abstractions of style that were becoming equally entrenched by then, due to the critical efforts of Walter Langhammer—a European émigré with political sympathy towards the nationalist movement who introduced expressionistic works and modernist aesthetics from the West to Indian students—and prolific art critic S. A. Krishnan, among others.
Charles Gerrard
The Young Musician
Plate from Exhibition Catalogue of Contemporary Indian Art curated by Charles Gerrard featuring leading contemporary young artists from Bombay (1942)
Collection: DAG
'CONTEMPORARY INDIAN ART’
Student and teacher-led exhibitions at the School started featuring the works of the ‘Young Turks’ Group—also known as the ‘Bombay Contemporary India Artists’. An important show was held against the backdrop of the Second World War, where Charles Gerrard highlighted the importance of Indian art’s attempt to claim the unbroken line of traditional art in the country, which was fostering, ‘as a result of much experiment’, a new contemporary Indian art outlook amongst his students. The miniature style work that he included in the show departed from his usual expressionistic style.
V. S. Adurkar
Untitled
Etching and aquatint on paper
Print size: 12.2 X 6.5 in. / 31.0 X 16.5 cm.
Paper size: 14.2 X 10.5 in. / 36.1 X 26.7 cm.
Collection: DAG
CHANGING OF THE GUARD
J. M. Ahivasi and Nagarkar were the leading exponents of Indian painting, which was encouraged by Solomon, while V. S. Adurkar would become the first Indian director of the School after India’s Independence. His journey, transitioning from a traditional artisanal community—where his caste was tied to a specific profession—to a studio artist working in a completely different professional sphere, highlights the evolution of the School and its educational goals since its inception.
Walter Langhammer
Portrait of a Woman at a Spinning Wheel
Oil on canvas
22.5 X 28.0 in. / 57.2 X 71.1 cm.
Collection: DAG
CRITICAL FRAMINGS
In the work of artists such as K.K. Hebbar and P.T. Reddy, a founder member of the ‘Young Turks’, one can see an evolution of style informed by debates that were central to the School’s functioning in the 1930s. Their search for cultural authenticity would also pick up on the abstractions of style that were becoming equally entrenched by then, due to the critical efforts of Walter Langhammer—a European émigré with political sympathy towards the nationalist movement who introduced expressionistic works and modernist aesthetics from the West to Indian students—and prolific art critic S. A. Krishnan, among others.
Charles Gerrard
The Young Musician
Plate from Exhibition Catalogue of Contemporary Indian Art curated by Charles Gerrard featuring leading contemporary young artists from Bombay (1942)
Collection: DAG
'CONTEMPORARY INDIAN ART’
Student and teacher-led exhibitions at the School started featuring the works of the ‘Young Turks’ Group—also known as the ‘Bombay Contemporary India Artists’. An important show was held against the backdrop of the Second World War, where Charles Gerrard highlighted the importance of Indian art’s attempt to claim the unbroken line of traditional art in the country, which was fostering, ‘as a result of much experiment’, a new contemporary Indian art outlook amongst his students. The miniature style work that he included in the show departed from his usual expressionistic style.
V. S. Adurkar
Untitled
Etching and aquatint on paper
Print size: 12.2 X 6.5 in. / 31.0 X 16.5 cm.
Paper size: 14.2 X 10.5 in. / 36.1 X 26.7 cm.
Collection: DAG
CHANGING OF THE GUARD
J. M. Ahivasi and Nagarkar were the leading exponents of Indian painting, which was encouraged by Solomon, while V. S. Adurkar would become the first Indian director of the School after India’s Independence. His journey, transitioning from a traditional artisanal community—where his caste was tied to a specific profession—to a studio artist working in a completely different professional sphere, highlights the evolution of the School and its educational goals since its inception.
As the city of Bombay flourished as a centre of trade under British rule in the nineteenth century, the J.J. School of Art was established with the aim of breathing new life into the arts and industrial craft traditions of India. Observational drawing practices, based on scientific principles, became the cornerstone of art education. And over time, the identities of the artists and craftsmen began to shift as pedagogical approaches evolved.
Subsequently, in the years leading up to India’s Independence, the emergence of the Swadeshi movement infused a nationalist consciousness into artistic practice that sought to reinvigorate indigenous traditions and brought about profound changes in aesthetic outlooks. At the School, these changes would inspire the emergence of a variegated modernism that sought to reconcile international innovations in style with the country’s rich cultural pasts. This culminated in the formation of the ‘Young Turks’ collective in 1941, who would help define post-Independence India’s visual language and pave the way for others to come.
This exhibition juxtaposes student works, sketches and documentary projects with masterpieces from the collections of DAG and The Sir J. J. School of Art, revealing how the School’s training influenced the formation of a complex artistic identity during the high noon of colonialism.
L. N. Taskar
Untitled (Maharashtra Temple Scene)
Oil on canvas
Collection: DAG
EMERGENCE
By the end of the nineteenth century there was a shift in emphasis from training craftsmen and their children, as reflected in the dropping of the word ‘Industrial’ from the School’s name in 1873. The artists we tend to remember from this period constituted the earliest galaxy of star pupils, drawn largely from the Presidency’s elite communities, which included M. V. Dhurandhar, who considered the School his ‘Temple of Art’, Abdul Aziz ‘Abalal’ Rahiman, M. F. Pithawalla, L. N. Taskar and Pestonji Bomanji. Their identity and practice as a new class of ‘fine’ artists was shaped by diverse assignments they took on as students, which ranged from design, decoration, documentation and portraiture.
Scholars have more recently argued against seeing these artists merely as mediums for disseminating a colonially-mandated educational agenda, choosing instead to focus on their ‘subtle contestations’ within the establishment.
Pestonji Bomanji
Untitled
Oil on Canvas, c. 1900
Registered work (non-exportable)
Collection: DAG
M. V. Dhurandhar
The Brass and Copper Wares of the Bombay Presidency (Lamps)
Lithograph on paper pasted on paper, 1896-97
Collection: DAG
CRAFTSMAN OR ARTIST?
The School’s focus on training native craftsmen was largely dependent on individual pedagogues. However, requirements for admission often asked for skills in literacy and mathematics, which became a significant barrier for these intended beneficiaries. Class hierarchies manifested visibly in photographic documentation of craft traditions and reports of exhibition displays. As the executive commissioner of the Colonial and Indian exhibition of 1886 would put it, the ‘body of native artizans’ (sic) put on display was ‘undoubtedly the most attractive feature of the whole Exhibition.’
M. V. Dhurandhar
Untitled
Oil on Paper
13.0 X 9.5 in. / 33.0 X 24.1 cm, Collection: DAG
TRAINING THE EYE
Following the model of the South Kensington School, London, art schools of India acquired plaster casts of sculptures, perpetuating new ideals of beauty inspired by classical European forms.
‘Standing in front of the huge plaster-of-Paris statues of the Venus de’ Medici… I felt as if in a dream…’, M.V. Dhurandhar wrote, ‘I went round and round the statues and yet I was not sated…’ Later in his career, however, while serving as temporary ‘inspector of examinations’, he criticised the use of inferior plaster cast copies, advocating instead for direct observation of natural forms.
Abalal Rahiman
Untitled
Charcoal dust on paper
17.5 X 14.0 in. / 44.45 X 35.56 cm, Collection: Sir J. J. School of Art
DRAWN FROM LIFE
Early stages of education were focused on teaching ‘accurate drawing’; progressing from elementary lines, freehand and shaded freehand to geometrical drawing. The aim was to proceed from ‘line to the solid object and then on to nature’.
Sir Richard Temple, a former Governor of Bombay and Director of Public Instruction would speak of drawing as a ‘specially civilising subject’. Author of The Elements of Drawing, John Ruskin’s belief in the interconnectedness of art, beauty, and morality positioned drawing as a transformative practice that shaped both individual character and societal values.
CLASSROOM TO COMMISSIONS
The academic curriculum of the School fluctuated throughout much of the nineteenth century, shaped by shifting perspectives on the abilities of Indian craftsmen and artisans, and evolving philosophies about the proper object of teaching art and craft. Early teachers emphasised the cultivation of aesthetic taste while introducing scientific methods of drawing and observation, structuring the curriculum into several progressive stages. By the end of the century, however, there was a conscious effort to balance scientific precision with creative expression.
Indian students started joining the faculty in the last decades of the nineteenth century, but they faced rigorous examination requirements to be deemed ‘Art Masters’. Only in 1916, when the Education Department standardised the curriculum and examinations across the Presidency, did teachers like M. V. Dhurandhar, L. N. Taskar and A. X. Trindade secure established positions in the academic hierarchy while simultaneously pursuing a range of private and commercial commissions beyond the School.
M. K. Parandekar
Untitled (Karla Caves)
Oil on Canvas
Collection: DAG
M. V. Athavale
Untitled
Pencil on Paper
27.5 x 19.5 in./69.85 x 49.53 cm
Collection: Sir J. J. School of Art
PORTRAIT AND FIGURE STUDY
The study of live models was approached after clearing stages in copying from casts and prints. The ‘scientific’ emphasis on drawing was further entrenched by the introduction of timed drawing exercises. Abalal Rahiman’s sketch includes a note: ‘5 hours’, while another hand has evaluated it: ‘Excellent!’
Artists like M. V. ‘Bapurao’ Athavale made several nude studies after it was added to the curriculum, frequently depicting models with their backs turned. Dhurandhar, in his memoirs, would write about some of the models that frequented the School’s studios, noting how their presence often stirred considerable excitement among the male students.
N. R. Sardesai
Jogeshwari Caves
Watercolour on paper, 1940
9.2 X 13.2 in. / 23.4 X 33.5 cm.
Collection: DAG
OPEN AIR PAINTING
Administrators like Cecil Burns utilised study tours to encourage students to develop a more romantic sensibility in their approach to depicting landscapes. Painting architectural features and landscapes became a mainstay for several artists following study tours, exemplified by D. C. Joglekar and N. R. Sardesai, whose portrayals of the Jogeshwari Caves are on view. Graduates like S. G. ‘Pant’ Jambhlikar, renowned for his sophisticated open-air watercolours, epitomised the trajectory of several artists who learned at the School and then became influential disseminators—as Jambhlikar did in Sangli.
D. G. Karanjgaonkar and R. D. Dhopeshwarkar
Untitled
Watercolour on paper, c. 1926
18.11 X 14.13 in. / 46.02 X 35.91 cm
Collection: Sir J. J. School of Art
THE SECRETARIAT COMMISSION
Principal Gladstone Solomon’s tireless advocacy secured a landmark achievement when the students of the school were commissioned to decorate parts of the newly built Imperial Secretariat in New Delhi. Students like R. D. Dhopeshwarkar, who spoke about his aim to synthesise realism with the distinctive Bombay Revivalist style, executed impressive murals featuring mythological and allegorical figures.
During this time, Solomon’s efforts also included a letter-writing campaign targeting dignitaries and officials across the bureaucracy and the princely states, often provocatively contrasting the School’s achievements against the output from its chief institutional rival—the art school in Calcutta.
THE SOCIAL LIFE OF THE SCHOOL
The history of the J. J. School today is often periodised by the tenure of its various British Principals, or landmark events like the establishment of different departments. A closer look into the world of artists like M.V. Dhurandhar, who took his role as an educator and artist in the public eye seriously, reveals his practice of ‘decades of careful self archiving’, and allows us to see the larger social world within which they lived.
Figures appear at the margins of photographs, paintings and personal testimonies, whose stories expand our notions of how students and faculty were practising art and shaping their own identities. Whether it was the influence of the cultural practices of the Pathare Prabhu community, or that of theatre, photography and cinema, we see the world outside the boundaries of the School and its curriculum through the family, friends and patrons of the artists.
M. V. Dhurandhar
Bal Gandharva
Oil on canvas pasted on board, 1941
Collection: DAG
Unidentified photographer
An institutional Photograph on the occasion of Dhurandhar officiating as the Director of J. J. School
Pestonji Bomanji
Self-Potrait
Unidentified photographer
M. V. Dhurandhar, Ambika Dhurandhar and Gangubai with students of J. J. School of Art during a study tour
EXPERIMENTS IN MODERNISM
For the modern to emerge, a historical accounting of past traditions was required. It provided an important stage, when Indian aesthetic traditions were approached—and eventually ‘revived’—through the rigour of an academic, reconstructed eye. Gladstone Solomon, Director of the Sir J. J. School from 1918 onwards, wrote: ‘Revivalism in art is not merely an act of nostalgia; it is a complex interplay of cultural identity and historical consciousness...’ Led by figures such as G. H. Nagarkar and J. M. Ahivasi the final decades of colonial rule saw a gathering of cultural forces that heralded the arrival of an ‘Indian’ style in western India.
Charles Gerrard, appointed Principal in 1936, is usually described as being a proponent of ‘Western’ Modernism. But as the range of works in this section demonstrates, it was not always easy to see these manoeuvres as oppositional. These divergent, and sometimes conflicting, routes would be apparent in the formation of the ‘Young Turks’ group in 1941.
Charles R. Gerrard
The Garden of the Director's Residence, the Sir J. J. School of Art, Bombay
Oil on Masonite board
Collection: DAG
Walter Langhammer
Portrait of a Woman at a Spinning Wheel
Charles Gerrard
The Young Musician
V. S. Adurkar
Untitled
\
Credits:
Curation and research: Ankan Kazi, Sumona Chakravarty, Shaon Basu, Shreeja Sen, Poonam Baid and Sanjana S. from DAG with Dr. Douglas John, The Sir J. J. School of Art, Architecture and Design
Research acknowledgements: Suhas Bahulkar, Partha Mitter, Ami Kantawala, Mahrukh Tarapor, Abigail McGowan, Giles Tillotson and Deepti Mulgund
Image Credits: D. C. Joglekar, Holy Masjid, Kalyan, Watercolour on paper, 13.0 X 19.5 in. / 33.0 X 49.5 cm., Collection: DAG
