Heritage Meets Freedom: The Bengal School and the Progressive Artists’ Group

In the first half of the twentieth century, Indian artists embarked on two successive quests to define a modern visual language for a newly assertive nation. The Bengal School of Art (c. 1905–1930s) arose as a nationalist revival of precolonial painting traditions, Mughal miniatures, Rajput manuscript illumination, and Ajanta cave frescoes, to counter British academic realism in colonial art schools (Britannica, “Bengal School of Art”; Sotheby’s). Four decades later, the Bombay Progressive Artists’ Group (PAG), founded in Bombay in November 1947, rejected both the colonial academism that persisted in Indian art institutions and the earlier revivalism of the Bengal School. Its six founders, F. N. Souza, S. H. Raza, M. F. Husain, K. H. Ara, H. A. Gade, and S. K. Bakre, proclaimed “absolute freedom for content and technique,” turning to European Modernist vocabularies (Cubism, Expressionism, Post-Impressionism) while recontextualizing indigenous themes (“Bombay Progressive Artists’ Group”; MAP Academy). Together, these two movements charted India’s entry into global modernism while asserting distinctly Indian identities.

The Bengal School emerged under the tutelage of E. B. Havell, principal of the Government College of Art and Craft in Calcutta, and the creative vision of Abanindranath Tagore. Havell’s critique of the colonial curriculum in the late 1890s emphasized Mughal and Rajput miniatures as exemplars of India’s spiritual heritage (Britannica, “Abanindranath Tagore”). In 1907, Havell and Tagore co-founded the Indian Society of Oriental Art to champion Swadeshi principles in art education and exhibitions (“Bengal School of Art”).

Tagore, Bharat Mata

Abanindranath Tagore (1871–1951) synthesized Mughal miniature conventions, delicate line, radial symmetry, and Rajput colour palettes with Ajanta’s layered wash techniques to create a nationalist idiom (Smarthistory). His Bharat Mata (c. 1905), a saffron-robed Mother India bearing a book, sheaves of rice, cloth, and garland, became the emblem of Swadeshi nationalism (Smarthistory; Wikipedia, Bharat Mata (painting). In Shakuntala (c. 1913), Tagore employed stylized flora and flattened depths directly inspired by Rajput manuscript illumination (AstaGuru).

Bose, Shiva Drinking Poison

Roy, Untitled (A Flower Pot)

Nandalal Bose (1882–1966), Tagore’s protégé at Santiniketan’s Kala Bhavana, extended the movement’s humanist ethos through lyrical village scenes and mythological narratives rendered in simple washes and rhythmic line. His Shiva Drinking Poison (1922) demonstrates the soft contours and spiritual ambience borrowed from Ajanta frescoes (Wikipedia, Nandalal Bose; DAG). Jamini Roy (1887–1972), initially trained in the Bengal School idiom, later distilled folk-inspired Patua forms, flattened, bold outlines, in early works such as Untitled (A Flower Pot) (c. 1910) before fully embracing folk revivalism (Asian Art Gateway).

Sher-Gil, Group of Three Girls

Raza, Lumiere D'ete

Husain, Mother Teresa

Although overt revivalism declined by the late 1920s in the face of rising modernist currents, the Bengal School’s emphasis on indigenous media, nationalist iconography, and spiritual representation persisted in Indian art curricula and informed later masters, Amrita Sher-Gil, S. H. Raza, and M. F. Husain, who drew upon these premises even as they engaged global modernism (Map Academy; Sotheby’s).

In the aftermath of Partition in August 1947, a younger generation of Bombay-based artists saw both colonial academism and historicist revivalism as inadequate for expressing India’s turbulent present. In November that year, F. N. Souza (expelled from Sir J. J. School of Art for political activism) joined S. H. Raza, M. F. Husain, K. H. Ara, H. A. Gade, and S. K. Bakre to form the Progressive Artists’ Group, declaring freedom from “the colonial yoke” and “anachronistic nationalism” in favour of an “anarchic” approach underpinned by “aesthetic order, plastic coordination, and colour composition” (Bombay Progressive Artists’ Group).

Bombay Art Society’s Salon in Kalaghoda

Their debut exhibition at the Bombay Art Society’s Salon in Kalaghoda (1948) juxtaposed Expressionist nudes, Cubist-inflected abstractions, and mythological themes, jolting audiences into a new critical engagement (MAP Academy). In Kolkata (1950) and again in Bombay (1953), the PAG staged similarly daring shows, despite having no formal sponsorship, and garnered attention in The Times of India and Bombay Chronicle (DailyArt Magazine).

Souza, Birth

Raza, Carcassone

Husain, Portrait of Souza

Souza’s Birth (1955) epitomizes his Expressionist figuration: a heavily pregnant nude rendered in a sombre palette and distorted forms to critique religious dogma (MAP Academy). Raza’s Carcassone (1951), part of his pre-Bindu phase, reveals Post-Impressionist colour harmonies and loose brushwork before his later turn to Tantric abstraction (Artisera). Husain’s Portrait of Souza (1950) combines fluid, calligraphic line with cinematic composition, foreshadowing his fusion of popular culture with modernist forms (Prinseps).

Gade, Omkareshwar

Ara, Untitled (Still Life with Nude)

H. A. Gade’s mathematical training manifests in structured, Cubist landscapes such as Omkareshwar (c. 1948), where geometric rigor and impasto knife-work evoke monsoonal drama (Wikipedia, H. A. Gade). K. H. Ara confronted conservative norms in post‐colonial India through his “Black Nude” series, notably the Untitled (Still Life with Nude), a watercolor, pastel, and pencil on paper, that presents the female form with striking naturalism and compositional boldness.

Bakre, Mother and Child

Bakre brought the PAG into three dimensions with intimate bronze torsos, Mother and Child (c. 1961), combining figurative abstraction with tactile surfaces (Wikipedia, Sadanand Bakre).

Mehta, Diagonal

Kumar, Untitled

Samant, Flower Garden

Although the PAG formally dissolved by 1956 following key departures to Paris and London, its members achieved global prominence, Husain in London and New York, Raza in Paris and Algiers, and Gade at the Venice Biennale, ensuring that its principles of formal liberty and cross-cultural dialogue endured (Widewalls; Sotheby’s). In India, the PAG’s challenge to academic orthodoxy firmly established Bombay (now Mumbai) as a leading centre of contemporary art, influencing modernists such as Tyeb Mehta, Ram Kumar, and Mohan Samant and inspiring institutions like the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art to highlight their legacy (Kiran Nadar Museum).

Together, the Bengal School of Art and the Bombay Progressive Artists’ Group chart the evolution of modern Indian art from nationalist revivalism to avant-garde experimentation. The Bengal School’s reappropriation of Mughal, Rajput, and Ajanta traditions laid the cultural groundwork for an Indian modernism rooted in spiritual and nationalist imperatives, while the PAG’s embrace of European Modernist techniques and unbridled formal freedom signalled India’s full arrival on the global art stage. Their successive but complementary visions continue to inform India’s artistic identity in the twenty-first century.

Works Cited

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Artisera. Merging Modernity with Tradition – Celebrating the Art of S.H. Raza. Artisera, 2015, https://www.artisera.com/blogs/expressions/159680775-merging-modernity-with-tradition-celebrating-the-art-of-s-h-raza. Accessed 8 Feb. 2025.

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Kala Bhavana | Art School | Shantiniketan. Map Academy, 2022, https://mapacademy.io/article/kala-bhavana-shantiniketan/. Accessed 8 Feb. 2025.

Mukul Dey. Asian Art Gateway, https://asianartgateway.com. Accessed 8 Feb. 2025.

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