A kaleidoscopic view of India’s rich painting traditions

'Painting the Modern in India’, a significant group show courtesy the Massachusetts-based Peabody Essex Museum (PEM), features those artists who attained fame during the freedom movement of India, then under British rule. To liberate themselves apparently from a position at the periphery of an elite art world drawn by the colonial establishment, they formed informal associations like the Calcutta Artists Group (1943), the Progressive Artists Group (1947) and the Delhi Shilpi Chakra (1949).

The renowned painters pioneered new approaches, repositioning their own practices internationally and in close relation to the ancient art history in the country. They created hybrid styles, an under-appreciated albeit essential element of the significant sweep of art in the mid 20th century.

After India’s independence in 1947, they took advantage of opportunities in prime art centers across the globe, especially London, New York and Paris, intensifying their collective quests for ‘aesthetic order, plastic coordination & color composition’, as termed by the Bombay Progressives." At the same time, these ambitious art practitioners probed their own artistic heritage, learning from the first show of Indian art in 1948 at Raj Bhavan in the capital city and seeking inspiration from heritage sites like the temples at Khajuraho and the old city in Benaras.

Equally impressive is ‘Wonder of the Age: Master Painters of India, 1100–1900’ organized by the Museum Rietberg Zurich along with the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MOMA), New York. This major loan exhibit is solely devoted to the Connoisseurship of Indian Painting, with more than 200 works of art chosen according to identifiable hands and named artists.

Structured chronologically, it traces the artistic achievement of each individual artist in each period. This is something quite important since Indian paintings have traditionally been classified according to regional styles or dynastic periods, with an apparent emphasis on subject matter and narrative content, an accompanying note reveals.

“Recent research, however, has begun to securely link innovations in style with specific artists and their lineages. Together with a careful study of artist's inscriptions and scribal colophons, it is now possible to construct a more precise chronology of the development of Indian painting,” it adds. The showcase dispels the perceived notion of anonymity in Indian art.