The sky is just beginning to brighten as the nayika walks home after a night-long tryst with her lover. Her eyes are lowered and she has drawn her odhni over her head. It’s a scene from a late 18th century miniature painting from Jodhpur. What draws attention, however, is the “modern” execution for a subject that is as old as love. At the nayika’s back is the dark-blue night, a symbol of her clandestine, amorous encounter and, ahead of her, is the all-seeing light of day, when she must strive to keep her rendezvous a secret. The striking originality of A Nayika Returning From a Tryst must have also caught the eye of scholar-collector Colonel RK Tandan, when he decided to add this beauty from Jodhpur to his large collection of miniature paintings. This was, after all, a man renowned for the “collector’s instinct” that helped him find the rare and the precious even in a junk shop.
Tandan, who died in 2009, had inherited his eye for art from his father, literary and art critic RC Tandan. During his stint in the army, he travelled across the country, searching for works to add to his collection. He took an early retirement from the army and settled down in Hyderabad to devote himself to this pursuit — collecting, writing and lecturing on India’s artistic heritage.
Many of the works collected by Tandan went under the hammer at Saffronart’s classical Indian art auction in December last year, including some of the finest examples of India’s miniature art tradition, such as the Baz Bahadur and Rupmati Riding at Night (c. 1765) from Nurpur in Kangra district, Himachal Pradesh, which shows the lovers gazing into each others’ eyes as they ride together through a lush, hilly landscape. Also on sale was a set of four ‘Ragamala’ paintings from early 18th century Basohli, a small fortress town in present-day Jammu and Kashmir, where a distinctive, vivid style of painting had evolved. The Ragamala tradition is a classic example of how art, poetry and music merged in classical Indian art. The paintings would depict the moods or rasa evoked by the ragas after which the works were named.
At the auction, two of the Basohli Ragamalas — Ragaputra Bhramarananda of Malkosa Raga and Ragaputra Gambhira of Sri Raga — sold for Rs 96 lakh each, a record for a Pahari painting sold in India. “The works represent the ancient heritage of Indian art and it is astonishing that they are so undervalued, not just in monetary terms, but also recognition,” says Hugo Weihe, Saffronart CEO. The auction, he hopes, will come to be looked upon as a landmark in the history of Indian classical art.
To some, Weihe might seem optimistic. The highest price for any work of art or antiquity at the December auction was paid for the SK Bhewdwar-Karanjavala Parvati, a monumental Vijayanagar bronze figure from 15th-16th century Tamil Nadu. Most Vijayanagar bronzes are unremarkable, modest descendants of the more accomplished Chola bronzes that preceded them. Not so the Parvati, which is something of a rarity, given the skill with which its understated elegance is rendered. The sculpture fetched Rs 6.48 crore at the auction. Compare this to the Rs 18 crore paid for a similar Vijayanagar Parvati in a Christie’s New York sale in 2007, the world auction record for a Vijayanagar bronze. Compare it also to the huge sums paid for works by modern masters such as VS Gaitonde, FN Souza, SH Raza and Tyeb Mehta. The world record for any Indian artwork sold at an auction is held by an untitled Gaitonde, bought for Rs 29.3 crore in December last year.
Weihe agrees that the sale of ancient Indian art has a long way to go and points to the Chinese art market as an example to emulate. “The bulk of the Chinese market is dominated by indigenous antiquities and classical works of art. In that sense, India is an anomaly in the world art market. Indigenous antiquities simply don’t generate the kind of interest they do elsewhere,” he says.
It was not always so. Much of what we know of the history of Indian art is because of collectors like Tandan, the Sarabhais of Ahmedabad and Mumbai-based scholar-collector Karl Khandalavala, who also became chairman of the Prince of Wales museum. They not only preserved the art but also studied it to produce scholarly works, such as Tandan’s Pahari Ragamalas and Khandalavala’s Pahari Miniature Paintings, which are still referred to by art historians across the world.
Perhaps the last such scholar-collector in India is Jagdish Mittal, 90, in Hyderabad. His globally celebrated collection is housed in a bungalow in Domalguda, Hyderabad, a nondescript suburban neighbourhood. It includes some of the finest of Indian art— Mughal, Pahari, Rajasthani, Deccani paintings and drawings, classical and folk bronzes, metalware like bidri, terracotta and ivory pieces and ancient wood carvings. But because of lack of space, he can only display the work to visitors when they take an appointment. Nevertheless, artists, scholars and collectors from across the world have travelled here to marvel at his treasures. A famous visitor was Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis who, with her magpie-like attraction to beautiful objects, added Indian paintings to her collection.
Mittal recalls being moved as a child by a reproduction of a painting in a Class VI history textbook. It was a colour print of a work, Two Ducks in a Landscape, presented by Prince Dara Shikoh, son of emperor Shah Jahan, to his wife. Another work in British art historian and critic Percy Brown’s Indian Painting (1918) had a similar impact. It depicted a group of villagers huddled around a fire. According to the book, the work belonged to the Kangra school of Pahari painting. “Years later, I found out that it was a work by Nainsukh,” he says. Nainsukh, an 18th century painter who worked in the royal house of Jasrota in Jammu and Kashmir, is now the subject of much scholarly research and recognised as one of India’s most original painters.
From 1945 to 1949, Mittal studied in Santiniketan under Nandalal Bose, who introduced him to the Calcutta-based Ajit Ghose, a leading scholar and collector of the day, whose collection of miniatures fired Mittal’s imagination. He also met Rai Krishna Das, the art historian and collector responsible for the establishment of the Bharat Kala Bhavan in Varanasi. Soon after, he acquired the first item in his collection — a beautifully-embroidered kantha piece that he bought off a fisherman for Rs 5.
The first half of the 20th century was a fruitful period for collectors in India. As art scholar Dr Pratapaditya Pal writes in his recent book In Pursuit of the Past: Collecting Old Art in Modern India circa 1875-1950, “Europeans had been looting and collecting the country’s archaeological heritage from at least the 17th century”. Much of it ended up in museums abroad.
In that sense, Indian collectors of the country’s heritage arrived a little late on the scene. Until the late 19th and early 20th century, it was European art and culture that had been in vogue. What changed, according to Pal, was the 1905 partition of Bengal and the wave of nationalism it triggered in the Indian elite. As a result, Indians went native in their collecting zeal. Amongst the earliest collectors were the Tagore brothers — Gaganendranath and Abanindranath—of Calcutta. They amassed a collection that included Mughal pictures and drawings, kanthas, ivory figures and jewellery. The Tatas of Bombay acquired a large number of paintings and decorative objects and are acknowledged to be the earliest collectors of the works of Nainsukh.
The enthusiasm of collectors began to dwindle with the implementation of the Antiquities Act of 1972. This Act was meant to “regulate the export trade in antiquities and art treasures, to provide for the prevention of the smuggling of, and fraudulent dealings in, antiquities.” As Weihe says, the intentions of the Act were noble, because it was meant to make sure that India’s heritage remained within its borders, available for viewing to art enthusiasts, scholars and researchers in the country.
The devil, as always, was in the detail. Not only did owners have to follow a cumbersome process for registering these works, there was the fear of government raids and compulsory acquisition. The other major concern was that anyone selling an antiquity had to get a licence to do so. Since many collectors would directly source antiquities from scrap and junk dealers, families of impoverished artists and farmers who stumbled about these treasures while tilling their fields, this was seen as another impediment.
As legitimate trade within the country became difficult, smuggling of antiquities increased and many treasures ended up in private collections, museums and galleries abroad. For example, the bronze Dancing Shiva and a stone sculpture of Ardhanarishwara — both about 900 years old — which were returned to India in 2014 by the Australian government, had ended up Down Under after being sold by art smuggler Subhash Kapoor. Other smuggled antiquities, such as the 12th century Parrot Lady, a sculpture returned to India by Canada last year, have also been returned as “goodwill gestures”.
The only way to stop the smuggling, as collectors and scholars have insisted, is that the government makes it easy to trade in antiquities and art treasures in the domestic market. This will also enable more private collections, which is crucial for any country that wishes to protect its heritage. Across the world, private collectors have contributed immensely to the preservation of culture. Many museums have depended on the generosity of these collectors, including museums in India, such as the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya in Mumbai, which houses the collections of businessmen Sir Dorabji Tata and Sir Ratan Tata as well as artefacts from collectors like Sir Purshottam Mavji and Karl and Meherbai Khandalavala.
Yet, one of the chief sentiments behind the Antiquities Act is a deep mistrust of private collecting. This can be seen in the provisions for compulsory acquisitions of antiquities by the government for preservation in a public place. “A lot of people are against the very idea of collecting, but if these collectors hadn’t existed, we wouldn’t know all that we do about Indian art history,” says Deepak Natesan of Mumbai’s Natesan’s Antiquarts.
Collectors have also rescued artefacts from the obscurity of rubbish heaps and attics. For example, Dinkar Kelkar, who set up the Raja Dinkar Kelkar Museum in Pune, travelled across western India and sought out pieces from temples, palaces and junk shops. His collection was eclectic. Besides paintings and statues, it included lamps, utensils and musical instruments. Most famously, he acquired the interiors of a run-down palace called Mastani Mahal, which had been built by Peshwa Bajirao I for his beloved second wife Mastani.
The work of collectors was also important in discovering and identifying previously unknown or unclassified forms of Indian art. Tandan, for example, has been credited by Khandalavala for the discovery of the Basohli Ragamala Paintings mentioned earlier. They were among the incomplete set of 65 miniatures he acquired from an elderly Brahmin woman, who he had visited during one of his periodic treasure hunts in the region. She, in turn, had received them as a wedding present from her grandfather, a court astrologer at Basohli.
With sales like the ones organised by Saffronart and other auction houses like Christie’s and Pundole’s, Mittal hopes that private collectors can again be encouraged to show interest in classical art. Under Mittal’s guidance, Sanjay Reddy, vice-chairman of the GVK group of companies, has amassed an impressive collection of classical art. The government has also indicated its interest in relaxing the provisions of the Act, with Union minister of culture, Mahesh Sharma, saying that India needs to have an open market in antiquities, in order for the smuggling to stop.
That is only the first step. Much effort needs to be poured into preservation, conservation and exhibition of the antiquities. Mittal, for example, has been waiting for the government to allot him land on which to build the Jagdish and Kamla Mittal Museum of Art, which currently only exists as a trust. “We want the public to be able to come and see the art too. Currently, one can see it only by appointment since we don’t have the space to exhibit. I was also hoping to develop the museum as a space where I could lecture and share my knowledge. But I’m still waiting,” says Mittal.
A quick guide to classical art
Jain and Buddhist illustrated manuscripts: The earliest manuscripts were made using prepared palm leaves; the oldest surviving examples date back to the 10th-11th century. After paper was introduced from Persia in the 12th century, it became the preferred medium; it was more versatile and allowed for larger compositions. These are the earliest surviving examples of the Indian painting tradition.
Mughal miniatures: The Mughal school of painting developed during Akbar’s reign, when the emperor established an atelier supervised by two Persian masters, Mir Sayyed Ali and Abdul Samad Khan. The style that developed was a synthesis of indigenous elements and the Safavid style of Persian painting, that was naturalistic and delicate.
Deccan paintings: The Deccani school of painting had flourished from the 16th century, independently of the Mughal school, with the main centres being the Sultanates of Ahmednagar, Bijapur and Golconda. From the late 17th and 18th century, it was more influenced by the Mughal style. It fused Persian, Turkish and south Indian Hindu elements.
Rajput miniatures: The unique styles of the Rajput schools of painting — Mewar, Marwar, Hadoti and Dhundar — developed in the last decades of the 16th century. One of the great contributors to their development was the growth of Vaishnavism and the Bhakti cult.
Pahari miniatures: Many distinctive schools of painting — Guler, Kangra, Basohli, Chamba, Garhwal — developed in the independent principalities established in the Punjab hills from the 17th to the 19th century, under the patronage of the Rajputs who ruled there. Pahari paintings drew on Mughal as well as Rajasthani influences and varied greatly in style — from the bold intensity of Basohli to the delicate, lyrical style of Kangra.
Gupta stone sculptures: It is during the Gupta period, between the 4th and 6th centuries, that Indian sculpture tradition is believed to have entered its classical phase. It brought together the plasticity of the earlier Mathura style and the elegance of the Amravati style and set a new standard for Indian sculpture.
South Indian bronze sculptures: While images cast in metal have had a long history in the Indian subcontinent, the art of bronze sculptures — made using the lost wax technique — was fully developed by the Pallavas of Kanchipuram in the 8th century and later, the Cholas of Tanjore. The famous image of the Nataraja is an example of the fluidity and sensuality unique to Chola sculptures.
Wood carvings: Used as a decorative element in temples, the tradition of intricate wood carvings was used across the subcontinent, from Kerala and Tamil Nadu to Gujarat and Orissa. Some of the earliest and finest examples were found in Kerala, which had an abundant supply of timber.
Resource: http://indianexpress.com
Resource:
No comments:
Post a Comment