Scenes from Santiniketan and Benodebehari’s Handscrolls – Travels to Kochi!

After the grand reception of the exhibition in Kolkata, followed by Santiniketan, it is now on its way to Kochi in Kerala. The exhibition will put on display – Scenes from Santiniketan — the earliest and longest handscroll ever painted by Benodebehari Mukherjee, depicting the 1920s landscape of Santiniketan, one of the primary art centres of the country. Besides this recently discovered 44.6 feet-long original scroll, the exhibition would further feature reproductions of all other handscrolls and existing fragments, including one from the collection of Victoria & Albert Museum, London.

In the words of the curator Prof. R. Siva Kumar, “The landscape handscroll is an East Asian innovation. While ancient Indian artists were keen observers of nature, landscape as a distinct genre was unknown in India before itinerant European artists brought it to India during the colonial period. While European landscapes presented appealing views as a framed scene, East Asian landscape handscrolls allowed showing a place in its totality.

Modern Indian artists became familiar with East Asian handscrolls and landscape tradition through early 20th-century Pan-Asianism. But none used it as imaginatively as Benodebehari.

Although later handscrolls by him were known, the discovery of this handscroll offers an insight into his early career, which was devoted to exploring nature as locally manifested. The present exhibition exploring Benodebehari’s handscrolls provides new insights into his engagement with landscape as a means of self-expression and a record of the evolution of his inner self.”