The 125th birth centenary of Jamini Roy, 'the unlettered outlaw' of the art world, is being celebrated at the NGMA.
In 1931, an exhibition of Jamini Roy's paintings at his Calcutta residence was inaugurated by ballerina and Indologist Stella Kramrisch. Writing on it, Shanta Devi, daughter of Modern Review editor-owner and later Hindu Mahasabha president Ramananda Chatterjee, described in great detail how three rooms of Roy's house had been transformed into a "traditional Bengali setting" complete with village pats (palm leaves) and alpona (decorative floor drawings). Eighty-two years later, on Roy's 125th birth anniversary, the National Gallery of Modern Art does not wear a Bengali look. There are no little lamps, no incense, as Shanta Devi wrote, and of course, no alpona.
What greets one instead is a handsome Jamini Roy, his deep-set eyes and head resembling, as his patron Maie Casey wrote, "the massive beauty of Picasso".
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