The movements taking place one after the other in European art and literature during the late 19th century and the early 20th century soon had a distinct bearing on India’s art and culture. During the colonial rule, India’s traditional arts got sidelined and the country witnessed the emergence of a new epoch in art that brimmed with Western thoughts, imported by the British.

It can be said that the modern era in Indian art started just around this time. In Assam, till the late 1920s, art did not have a telling presence in the cultural firmament as there was greater focus on literature, necessitated by the crises the Assamese language had been going through. At that time, the general people of Assam were far away culturally from the mainland and Kolkata, that was one of the nerve-centres of the composite Indian culture.

In the 1920s, four youths from Assam, after getting art lessons in Kolkata, came back to settle down in their native places and ushered in a change in this direction. These four pioneering artists were Muktanath Bordoloi of Dibrugarh, Suren Bordoloi of Jorhat, and Jagat Singh Kachari and Pratap Baruah of Tezpur.

At that time, the Bengal School of Art was at the peak of its fame and influence. The Awahan magazine, after making its debut in 1929, started publishing paintings of these four artists and also tried to give the Assamese people a fair idea of what art was all about through works of modern Indian art and enlightening articles. According to eminent poet-art critic Nilmoni Phukan, the only people who were blessed with a natural and proper feel for art during this crucial period of Assam’s cultural history were Sarbeswar Kotoky and Rupkonwar Jyotiprasad Agarwala. Sarbeswar Kotoky was the first person to have made a pioneering research into Assamese ancient art. The article he wrote in Awahan in 1931 is considered to be an important landmark in this direction. Therefore, the modern era in Assam’s art is believed to have started with the beginning of the famed Awahan Yug.

Among the few paintings produced by these four artists, Kanikhola by Mutanath Bordoloi, Jakoiya Sowali by Jagat Singh Kachari and Apples by Pratap Baruah are the most famous. Broadly, Kanikhola combines a local theme with Western techniques. It is significant, however, from the social point of view: it stands as a grim reminder of the rampant consumption of kani in Assam during the British rule that proved to be a bane for the entire Assamese nation. Pratap Baruah’s Apples is believed to be the first ‘still-life’ in Assam. Jagat Singh Kachari was blessed with powerful drawing skills, which is evident in Jakoiya Sowali. Suren Bordoloi, despite being an extremely gifted artist, could produce very little due to abject poverty. The portrait of Radhakanta Handique made by him — kept in the Chandrakanta Handique Bhawan in Jorhat — speaks much of his genius. In Roop Barna Bak, Nilmoni Phukan gives us a measure of Suren Bordoloi’s disillusionment. Bordoloi literally advised aspiring artists against taking up art as a profession, lest they would meet the same fate as his!

Such was the state of affairs in the 1930s. Due to lack of ambition, economic constraints and absence of an environment conducive to art at that time, these artists were forced to put art lower in their list of priorities. We have mentioned what happened to Suren Bordoloi. Muktanath Bordoloi, who is considered to be the first of the modern Assamese artists, also turned a photographer. The other two did pursue art for a while, but never really could go the distance.

It’s not as if the works made by these artists were truly great works of Assam art from a technical point of view. But, they are indeed significant from the historical standpoint. These artists, without an iota of doubt, were the torchbearers for all of us. They might not have been able to fully translate their dreams into reality due to the disadvantageous time they lived in. But they and their works secure an important place in the history of Assam’s art.

d.bezbarua@yahoo.co.in

Debasish Bezbaruah