A new monograph by author Anuradha Ghosh explores Jamini Roy’s evolution from a modernist European painter to a local folk connoisseur, bringing to light the multiple facets of the man for whom art was both a livelihood and a meditative journey.
Jamini Roy: A Painter Who Revisited the Roots follows the artist’s life of disciplined simplicity along with his quirks and idiosyncrasies. It explores Roy’s art and life, right from the late 1910s till his very last days.
The book will be launched on July 29 at India International Centre, New Delhi. Published by Niyogi Books, the monograph closely examines the painter’s journey into the realms of Bengal’s folk art.
Roy’s identity as a painter was nourished and nurtured not only by the painted scrolls of indigenous patuas or Kalighat pats, but also the temple murals of Bankura, terracotta figurines, floor art, and folk songs, dances and rituals.
Though the artist wanted to embed his works singularly in the folk tradition, Western instruction and style do mediate his works. The narrative explores how Roy’s lived experience of urban and rural settings informed his style.
“The profundity of the essential and the significant in our lives got especially noticed because of the basic lifestyle that we were forced to adapt to then. This point had underpinned not only Roy’s life but his art practice as well: his simple, frugal lifestyle was echoed in the simplified, significant forms he worked with,” said Ghosh.
“This, unconsciously perhaps, became the central motif of the book, which saw the life of this remarkable man — and his timeless work — as virtually inseparable,” she added.
Niyogi Books director Trisha De Niyogi said there had been a dearth of concise handbooks on Roy despite his fame as a master painter. “We want to give an idea of Jamini Roy as a man and a painter to young minds.”