Bengal School of Art (1881)

Introduction

The Bengal School of Art, commonly referred to as the Bengal School, was an artistic movement and style of Indian painting that originated in Bengal, primarily Calcutta and Shantiniketan, and flourished throughout the Indian subcontinent during the British Raj in the early 20th century. Also known as the "Indian painting style" in its early days, it was associated with Indian nationalism (swadeshi) and led by Abanindranath Tagore (1871–1951), but was also promoted and supported by British arts trustees such as E. B. Havell, the director of Calcutta's Government College of Arts and Crafts since 1896. It eventually led to the development of modern Indian painting (‘Bengal School of Art’). The artists aimed to bring a powerful voice to Indian identity, freedom and liberation by synthesizing folk art, Indian painting traditions, Hindu images and depictions of contemporary rural life. It was developed by the Swadeshi and was a form of resistance that provoked Indian nationalism. The Bengal School of Art emerged as a revolutionary and nationalist movement reacting against academic art styles previously promoted in India. It replaced Western styles with Mughal, Rajasthani and Pahari styles that presented elegant scenes of distinct Indian traditions and everyday life. Ernest Binfield Havell, a huge lover of Indian art forms, tried to reform teaching methods at the Calcutta School of Art by replacing European paintings and the plaster cast of Western antiquities from the school's art gallery with Indian artworks. Havel also helped Bengal School artists such as Abanindranath Tagore and his sister Sunayani Devi to fully develop the principles and style of the movement and promote its dissemination through education systems. He persuaded Abanindranath to study paintings by Mughal and Rajput and also appointed him deputy director of the School of Fine Arts. Abanindranath, being a pioneer, learned the technique of watercolor and by composing it with the European color technique, created the new Wash technique. This became the hallmark of the Bengal school and marked the importance of the traditional Tempera method (Laxmi).

History

The Bengal school emerged as a pioneering and nationalist movement reacting against the academic art styles previously promoted in India, both by Indian artists such as Raja Ravi Varma and in British art schools. Following the influence of Indian intellectual ideas in the West, British art teacher Ernest Binfield Havell sought to reform teaching methods at the Calcutta School of Art by encouraging students to imitate miniature Mughals. This caused controversy, leading to a student strike and denunciations from the local press, including nationalists who saw it as a regressive move. Havel was supported by artist Abanitranath Tagore, nephew of poet Rabindranath Tagore. Tagore painted a number of works influenced by Mongol art, a style that he and Havel believed expressed India's distinct spiritual qualities, as opposed to the "materialism" of the West. Tagore's best-known painting, Bharat Mata (Mother India), depicted a young woman, depicted with four hands in the manner of Hindu deities, holding objects symbolic of India's national ambitions. Tagore later tried to develop ties with Japanese artists as part of his ambition to construct a pan-Asian model of art. Through his paintings "Bharat Mata", Abanindranath established the paradigm of patriotism. Painters and artists of the Bengal school were Nadalal Boze, Chugtay, Sunayani Devi (sister of Abanidranath Tagore), Manishi Day, Mukul Day, Kalipada Gosal, Asit Kumar Khaldar, Sundhir Hasgir, Ksitindranath Maiumdar, Sugra Rababi. The influence of the Bengal school in India declined with the spread of modernist ideas in the 1920s. Since 2012, there has been an increase in interest in the Bengal art school among scholars and connoisseurs. Bimal Seal was a contemporary of Abanidernath Tagore. He painted with watercolors. His works can only be found in private collections (‘Bengal School of Art’).

 Politics

During British rule, as part of the colonial agenda. The British established art schools in Mumbai, Madras and Calcutta to spread Western values in art education. They persuaded educated Indians to believe that Indians had no cultural heritage of their own. This led to the decline of traditional conventions and styles of Indian art. At this point in an identity crisis, the Bengal School of Art emerged with highly gifted artists such as Raja Ravi Verma, Abanidranath Tagore, Gaganendranath Tagore, Nadalal Bose, and Jamini Roy. These artists gave a sense of direction to the country's art movement and thus prevented its downfall (Laxmi).

Further, Western influences had begun to influence Indian art. Some artists developed a style that used Western ideas of composition, perspective, and realism to portray Indian themes, with Raja Ravi Varma occupying a prominent place among them. The Bengal school emerged as a pioneering and nationalist movement that reacted against the academic art styles previously promoted in India, both by Indian artists such as Varma and in British art schools. After the widespread influence of Indian intellectual ideas in the West, British art teacher Ernest Binfield Havel tried to reform teaching methods at the Calcutta School of Art by encouraging students to imitate miniature Mughals. This caused huge controversy, leading to a student strike and denunciations from the local press, including nationalists who felt it was a retrograde move. [citation needed] Havel was supported by artist Abanitranath Tagore, nephew of poet Rabindranath Tagore (‘Modern Indian Painting’).

Arts

The modern Indian art movement in Indian painting is thought to have begun in Calcutta in the late nineteenth century. The old traditions of painting had more or less disappeared in Bengal and new art schools were started by the British. Initially, protagonists of Indian art such as Raja Ravi Varma relied on Western traditions and techniques, including oil painting and easel painting. A reaction to Western influence led to a revival of primitivism, called the Bengal art school, which drew on India's rich cultural heritage. It was succeeded by the Santiniketan school, led by Rabindranath Tagore's return to idyllic rural folk and rural life. Despite its influence throughout the country in the early years, the importance of the school declined from the forties and is now as good as dead (‘Modern Indian Painting’).

Music

Indian classical music is the classical music of the Indian subcontinent. It has two important traditions: the classical music of North India known as Hindustani and the South Indian expression known as Carnatic. These traditions were not separate until about the 15th century. During the period of Mongol rule of the Indian subcontinent, traditions separated and evolved into separate forms. Hindustani music emphasizes improvisation and exploration of all aspects of a raga, while Carnatic performances tend to be based on short compositions. However, the two systems still have more in common than differences. The roots of India's classical music lie in the Vedic literature of Hinduism and the ancient Natyashastra, the classical Sanskrit text on the performing arts by Bharata Muni. The 13th-century Sanskrit text Sangeeta-Ratnakara of Sarangadeva is regarded as the definitive text by both Hindustani music and Carnatic musical tradition. Indian classical music has two fundamental elements, raga and tala. The raga, based on a diverse swara repertoire (notes that include microtones), forms the fabric of a deeply complex melodic structure, while the tala measures the time cycle. Raga gives an artist a palette to build melody from sounds, while tala provides them with a creative framework for rhythmic improvisation using time. In Indian classical music the space between notes is often more important than the notes themselves and traditionally avoids Western classical concepts such as harmony, counterpoint, chords or modulation (‘Indian Classical Music’). In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Indian classical music was in transition in the way music was interpreted, produced, consumed, and learned. Most scholars of this transition emphasize the choices of professional musicians, as these musicians and the institutions in which they operated were involved in political and economic movements such as nationalism and commercialization. Before the nineteenth century, professional musicians were maintained by temples and courts, while from the second half of the nineteenth century onwards, patronage declined, patrons became poorer than before, and musicians traveled extensively in search of a new market for their arts which they found in the rising middle class in port cities.  that is, Mumbai, Calcutta and Madras. This created a new generation of musicians, whose predecessors were not musicians, and thus encouraged the creation of music schools and public concerts and lowered barriers to learning. In other words, music became a popular commercial art (Roy).

Notable Compositions

Alap in Misra Kafi – Ali Akbar Khan (chronology, duration)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9OHCFoOCfk  

Ali Akbar Khan (14 April 1922 – 18 June 2009) was an Indian classical Maihar garana musician known for his skill in playing the sarod (‘Ali Akbar Khan’).

Raga Darbari - Ustad Ali Bakhsh Zahoor

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YldVYl5C5g  

Ustad Ali Baksh Jarnail Khan (1850–1920) was an Indian classical singer. Together with his friend Fateh Ali Khan, he founded Patyala Garana in the 19th century. They used to sing together as a group back then (‘Ali Baksh Jarnail’).

Raga Bahar - Ustad Bundu Khan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rx9AGiHPPic  

Ustad Bundu Khan (1880–1955) was an Indian musician and top sarangi player and one of the 20 most skilled Hindustani instrumentalistsTh Century. In 1985 he was awarded an award by the Government of Pakistan (Ustad Bundu Khan  -- Raga Bahar).

Maanam Vaitharul - Anai Ayya

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NE5tGqrI6uE  

The Anai Ayya brothers were two brothers, who lived in the 19th century in Tamil Nadu and were composers of Carnatic music. Anai Iyer and Annavaiyyar composed in both Telugu and Tamil and used the Umadasa mudra (‘Anai Ayya Brothers’).

parulanna mAta - Dharmapuri Subbarayar

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWkuZFR5y9A  

Dharmapuri Jaavali Subbarayar was a composer of Carnatic music who lived during the nineteenth century. He composed mainly in Telugu and used Dharmapuri, the name of his birthplace and a town in Tamil Nadu, as his mudra (‘Dharmapuri Subbarayar’).

Bibliography

‘Abdul Karim Khan’. Wikipedia, 11 Nov 2022. Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Abdul_Karim_Khan&oldid=1121240755.

Abdul Karim Khan - Raag Karharapriya. Directed by Archisman Mozumder, 2015. YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvcioIpG8fE.

‘Ali Akbar Khan’. Wikipedia, 29 Dec. 2022. Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ali_Akbar_Khan&oldid=1130368713.

‘Ali Baksh Jarnail’. Wikipedia, 31 Aug. 2022. Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ali_Baksh_Jarnail&oldid=1107732480.

‘Anai Ayya Brothers’. Wikipedia, 3 Nov. 2019. Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Anai_Ayya_brothers&oldid=924306542.

‘Bengal School of Art’. Wikipedia, 22 Sept. 2022. Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bengal_School_of_Art&oldid=1111717361.

‘Dharmapuri Subbarayar’. Wikipedia, 13 June 2020. Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Dharmapuri_Subbarayar&oldid=962296870.

‘Indian Classical Music’. Wikipedia, 3 Dec. 2022. Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Indian_classical_music&oldid=1125360844.

Laxmi, Deepikka. ‘Pratha’. PRATHA, 17 Nov. 2020, https://www.prathaculturalschool.com/post/bengal-school-of-art.

‘Modern Indian Painting’. Wikipedia, 22 Aug. 2022. Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Modern_Indian_painting&oldid=1105892317.

Roy, T. ‘Music and Society in Late Colonial India: A Study of Esraj in Gaya’. The Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 79, no. 1, 2020, pp. 25–49.

Ustad Bundu Khan  -- Raga Bahar. Directed by Subrata Chowdhury, 2015. YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rx9AGiHPPic.