Page 49 - Pundole's Auction M0015

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PROPERTY FROM THE FAMILY COLLECTION OF
NANDALAL BOSE

RABINDRANATH TAGORE innate to his personality, and contributed to his emergence
as an artist. A world traveller and a creative artist with
1861?–?1941 interest in cross-cultural contacts, he looked at the art
of the countries he travelled to. Sometimes he did this
Bird with greater purposefulness and self-awareness, as he
did during his 1916 visit to Japan. But often he merely
Ink on brown paper absorbed them, and without discussion or record allowed
9¾ × 15? in. (24.8 × 39.1 cm.) them to sink to the bottom of his awareness, from where
they subliminally guided his thoughts and rose to the
??6,00,000?–?8,00,000 surface when required. Primitive and modern art that he
saw during his many travels abroad played such a role in
NATIONAL ART TREASURE – NON-EXPORTABLE ITEM his emergence as an artist.’ (R. Siva Kumar, ‘Rabindranath
(Please refer to the Terms and Conditions of Sale Tagore as Painter and Catalyst of Modern Indian Art’, The
at the back of the catalogue) Last Harvest, Ahmedabad, 2011, p. 56)

PROVENANCE: The current work was sketched on an envelope printed
From the collection of Nandalal Bose’s eldest daughter, for Sankhya, the Indian Journal of Statistics, which was
Gouri Bhanja, nee Bose and thence by descent. founded in 1933. Tagore wrote the introductory essay for
Volume II, Part 1 of the 1935 Sankhya publication. The
In reference to Tagore’s art, Siva Kumar states, ‘The current work is likely to date from the same period.
inclination to know and understand other cultures was
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