Living Art: What Rabindranath Tagore's artwork at Christie's says about Nobel laureate's prowess as a painter

The name Rabindranath Tagore conjures up magic. Tagore, whose life spanned 80 years from 1861-1941, won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913 and was the first Asian in that era to be awarded a Nobel in any field.

By the age of 60, Tagore was viewed as India’s foremost writer. Besides overseas literary celebrities, everyone from Mahatma Gandhi to Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru visited him at Shantiniketan (Abode of Peace), a town which is the great bard’s brainchild. He had penned a mind-blogging body of poetry and songs. In tandem, he wrote unforgettable novels, short stories, dramas, dance dramas and essays.

But, post-sixty, a curious facet also opened up in his life. He turned to painting. And, came up with the most devastating and haunting works.

The import of his prominence as an artist became apparent when he was bracketed as one of nine painters designated as Indian National Art Treasures, which implies that this category of works are invested with a richness of cultural value and heritage where their exports are ruled out legally by the Government of India.

It is therefore rare, says Damian Vesey, specialist in South Asian Modern and Contemporary Art at world’s leading auction house Christie’s, for one of Tagore’s pictures to come up for sale.

It’s rarer still for one of such quality as Untitled (Couple), which he painted in around 1930, and which at 56.8 x 45.7 cm is considerably larger than most of his works. The painting was offered for sale in Christie’s September’s 2021 South Asian Modern and Contemporary Art auction in a year that marks Tagore’s 160th birth anniversary.

Rabindranath Tagore’s Untitled (Couple), created in the early 1930s is a mixed media on paper laid on card. It is 56.8 x 45.7 cm work and carried an estimate of $120,000-180,000 at the Christie’s September 2021 sale in New York. It sold for a record $637,500.

“In the 1920s and early 1930s he was at the peak of his fame,” says Vesey, “and I think he very much capitalised on that, wanting to spread his ideas and reach as many people as possible. He felt that his art was able to express something that his writing could not, and having a big exhibition in the thriving art scene of Paris, and then across Germany, would have maximum impact.” It was in Germany that Untitled (Couple) was bought by a member of the Rathenau family, who now put it under the hammer at Christie’s.

Tagore was not formally groomed to walk into the shoes of an artist and many of his paintings started as notebook doodles, which he then worked up either into complex abstract forms or into images of birds and animals that had, as he put it, “unaccountably missed (their) chance of existence”.

Says Vesey, “He gave the impression that these works were achieved almost spontaneously, by exploiting the unconscious and the accidental.” His paintings of people, such as Untitled (Couple), were also done from the imagination rather than from life, painted in a style that Vesey describes as “flat, non-naturalistic or naïve”.

“In Europe, his paintings were seen as the artworks of the guru and mystic,” says Vesey, “and I think it is very hard to separate the art from the artist at that time.” Vesey thinks it is also hard to say whether the paintings were considered as Indian art or Modern art. “I think it’s impossible not to see them as Modern art, but the pull would have been that they were by Rabindranath from India. There was definitely an element of ‘exotic India’ being an identity marker for these works.”

In India itself, Tagore’s work is equally difficult to place, according to Vesey. “His nephews Abanindranath Tagore and Gaganendranath Tagore and painters such as Nandalal Bose are seen as critical figures when it comes to the Bengal School, and Rabindranath is a key part of that,” says Vesey, “but aesthetically his work is so different from it.”

In Untitled (Couple), the woman’s head-dress and the man’s hat provide visual cues, but if you look across the length and breadth of Tagore’s work, he is not, like many of the artists around him, saying: “Here I am, painting something that is quintessentially Bengali.”

One can perhaps look at Tagore’s art in terms of what it’s not: it’s not painting of western or colonial subjects. In fact, it’s the complete “antithesis of that European academic realism that the British were still encouraging in the first half of the 20th century.

That’s where the revolutionary, nationalist, Bengali element comes in”, in Vesey’s view.

Vesey says that Tagore’s portrayal of the figures in Untitled (Couple) is unlike most of his paintings of human subjects. “In the 10 years I’ve been at Christie’s, I’ve never seen a large Tagore watercolour that is so intimate, and there is a softness you don’t see in a lot of his work,” he explains.

When he is not painting his “fantastical birds”, he tends to paint one dominant figure in the centre of the picture, sometimes in profile but more often “face-on” and with that kind of classically recognisable long nose and mask-like face. So having this intimate image of two figures in profile is very unusual.

“Tagore’s not really a narrative painter, but there is a specificity to this work and a sensitivity that would make one ask whether it was a portrayal of two actual people or whether it came out of his imagination. And there aren’t many Tagore works you’d ask that question about,” sums up Vesey.

Helping one to get a peep into the phase since when Christie’s has been auctioning Rabindranath Tagore artworks, to allow art buffs to form a perspective, Deepanjana Klein, International Head of Indian and Southeast Antiquities and Modern and Contemporary Art at Christie’s, comments: “Rabindranath’s works outside India are very rare and few come to market. The first works came to market in the late 1990s in the UK, often from larger, established collections.

“Christie’s offered its first lots by Rabindranath Tagore in 2013 as part of the Supratik Bose Collection. Supratik Bose was the grandson of Nandalal Bose, the legendary pioneer of Indian art who founded Kala Bhavana, the renowned art school at Rabindranath’s Visva Bharati University at Santiniketan. The first work sold at Christie’s was titled Where the Mind is Without Fear, an illustrated poem from Rabindranath’s Nobel Prize-winning collection of poems, Gitanjali.”

Dwelling on the performance of Tagore’s paintings at overseas auctions over the years, Deepanjana underscores Rabindranath’s works are hard to come upon offshore. “When undiscovered or ‘fresh’ to the market are found with exciting provenance, they have consistently done very well. Christie’s has proudly held the world auction record for Rabindranath since 2013. In our recent sale in New York this September, Christie’s set a record of $637,500 for the exceptional painting, Untitled (Couple), against an estimate of $120,000-180,000.”

Looking back to the period since when, roughly, Rabindranath Tagore’s paintings began climbing on the price front significantly, Deepanjana explains that Rabindranath cannot be taken in isolation. Prices for the artist grew since the late 1990s/early 2000s when the South Asian Modern and Contemporary art auction market became established. “The mid 2000s saw a huge rise in prices in modern art from the region. However, given the rarity, prices for the Rabindranath paintings have been less subject to speculation in terms of financial assets. So, they have been less volatile. Instead, prices for a Rabindranath have consistently risen over time and drastically, driven mostly by quality, rarity, and provenance,” Klein enumerates.

To a crucial question whether Rabindranath Tagore can be viewed as the first Modernist of Indian art, Deepanjana drives home that “many would consider him as the first modern Indian artist. Today, the world remembers the great Rabindranath Tagore as a renowned poet and the first Asian to win the Noble Prize in Literature in 1913. This achievement alone stands as a testament to an extraordinary life. The esteemed honour of being a Noble Laureate for most would be the culmination of a career, but for Tagore, the ultimate polymath, this accolade was merely the tip of the iceberg. For India, he was the very embodiment of a national cultural renaissance, and a pivotal figure in shaping the modern nation”.

She opines that with Rabindranath Tagore’s works becoming rarer and rarer, and more works being repatriated to India, “I can only see Rabindranath works achieving even higher prices. We really do not know how many works are out there or when the next discovery will be”.

Bracketed amongst renowned memorabilia of Tagore’s paintings which have been auctioned by Christie’s are the Supratik Bose Collection “which was an incredible honour as it was the first major collection of Bengal School of Art, including three Tagores and Nandalal Bose works, to come to market. Christie’s has also handled iconic works from the Lahiri Collection. However, often these works come as one-off discoveries”, says Deepanjana.

The recent record coming from Germany is a perfect example. Rabindranath brought Untitled (Couple) with him on a trip to Germany where he gave readings to packed venues with huge crowds hoping to hear the Indian poet speak on spirituality, harmony, ecology, and education. It was on this trip that Rabindranath enjoyed the company of many German liberal intellectuals whom he befriended in the early 20s. It was in Germany that Untitled (Couple) was bought by a member of the Rathenau family, who now put it under the hammer at Christie’s in September 2021.

But, don’t old Bengal paintings like that of Rabindranath Tagore require to be backed by exceptional provenance (ownership and historical pedigree), I pose to Deepanjana. “Provenance is critical,” pat comes her response. “First, works by Rabindranath Tagore are considered non-exportable National Art Treasures. Therefore, Christie’s can only offer works that have been outside of India prior to 1972. We need to have clear provenance to trace a work back to the artist.

“This is particularly the case with paintings as to not only ensure we do our due diligence in terms of authenticity, but also so that we can fully understand a work from an academic perspective. I believe provenance becomes inseparable to the work itself; the recent world record has such an exciting story that adds to its brilliance and I can’t imagine the painting without its history,” emphasises Deepanjana.

Since Bengal School paintings, including those of Rabindranath Tagore, are well-known for fakes, Christie’s, according to Deepanjana, closely examines archival materials in its libraries as well as any materials that the owners may have, to prevent counterfeit works from creeping into the auction catalogue. “Our aim is to trace the work from the current owner back to Tagore as clearly as possible. If there is any doubt, no matter how small, then we cannot accommodate (the work) in Christie’s actions. This level of vigilance applies to Christie’s worldwide, and this explains why that we have been trusted for over 250 years,” she says emphatically.

Expanding on the significance that buyers/bidders attach to Rabindranath Tagore’s paintings, Deepanjana underlines that Rabindranath sports a tremendous legacy as the renaissance man of a modern India, both as a hugely gifted painter and a writer who has etched his name in immortality: Rabindranath was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913 “because of his profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse, by which, with consummate skill, he has made his poetic thought.” His artworks are also not akin to any other artist. “There is a purity, nativity, and primal potency that sets them apart entirely. Tagore felt his paintings helped him express something universal that his words could not. Tagore infused his peaceful spirit and soothing qualities into every work that he made,” observes Klein.

It can be aired, without batting an eyelid, that Rabindranath Tagore’s vast expanse of creative output will continue to mesmerise his unending admirers through generations till creativity is alive.

Ashoke Nag is a veteran writer on art and culture with a special interest in legendary filmmaker Satyajit Ray.