May 27, 1959

Kooko Bird and Banana Trees

Indian, 1882 - 1966

In contrast to the extraordinary diversity of his production of the 1920s through the 1940s, the work Nandalal Bose created after his retirement from running the art school at Santiniketan is characterized by a consistency of technique. He almost exclusively made monochromatic ink drawings, or sumi-e as they are called in Japanese. His subjects were no longer mythological or iconic, but instead pertained to nature. The landscape and elements of nature depicted in this sumi-e is imagined and formed from memories, and the audience was to be none other than god. In making this work, Bose sought to find the life rhythm in nature, which he saw as being identical to the divine presence of god in the icon of a temple, and in the soul of every living being.