Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c11.s4.t3.82

v2.c11.s4.t3.82

Nandalal Bose was born on December 3, 1882 in a middle-class Bengali family of Kharagpur, then in Bihar. After completing basic education in his hometown, he moved to Calcutta in 1897 at the age of 15 and entered Khudiram Bose’s Central Collegiate School where he did not fare well in the examinations. Thereafter, he joined the Commercial course of Presidency College under the pressure of his family members. But his interests and ambitions were elsewhere. While in Calcutta (present-day Kolkata), he used to spend most of his time in sketching his surroundings and copying the works of European masters like Raphael, while following the style of Raja Ravi Verma. He also tried to learn some basic skills in drawing and painting from his cousin, Atul Mitra. In view of such avid interests in painting shown by him, he was finally allowed by his family members to join the Calcutta Art School of E B Havell and Abanindranath Tagore in 1905, and he continued to pursue his artistic career there till 1910 under the erudite guidance and supervision of the latter. These years proved to be the most fruitful years for the young artist during which period two of his paintings, “Sati Mounting the Pyre” and “Satir Dehatyag”, received high public acclaim in the first exhibition of the Indian Society of Oriental Art held in the Art School of Kolkata in 1908.