Rabindranath Tagore: The Vivified Vision of Nature in Art

Magnificence of Nature… Nature, the inexhaustible treasure trove of creativity, generated inspirations from the very onset of human civilization. Any visual culture is read, realized and recognized in the context of its land of origin, i.e geographical as well as the social environment. Society and culture are interwoven with nature, and art in its manifold forms, mediums and expressions represents such issues and realizations of our daily existence.

Ever since the advent of civilization, man has either been enamored of the beauty of nature or has worshipped it due to its antagonistic powers. Artists, poets, litterateurs and musicians around the globe, in different periods of history, have composed poems, painted pictures, and written essays on the immense stimulating orders of nature.

After all it is nature that instills the mystery and magnificence into our otherwise materialistically inclined society. Nature has all the spellbinding, captivating charm of the infinite. And visual arts and music are perhaps the only two media of expression to express the depth of such a feeling that can surmount cross- cultural barriers more easily than the written language in general. Often retaining to certain culture -specific idioms or icons by means of depiction, Art as a whole surpasses the cultural constraints of written or spoken language.

In recent years “nature”, environment’, “ecology” to name a few are much talked -about terms. It is so because the world at large has started questioning the ecological sustainability and the fragile environmental context of the human race, which thereafter has infiltrated into the artists awareness too.

As we all know such an idea about sustainable ecological entity was most appropriately conceived by none other than the multifaceted genius Rabindranath Tagore way back in the beginning of 20th century. Tagore perhaps was the first visionary in British India to consciously realize and relate the underlying synthesis between nature and culture ; a thought that later culminated into his establishment of Santi Niketan.

Having an immense reverence for nature and also being a practicing painter myself the present article thereby attempts to simply read Tagore’s nature representations along with the related technicalities as a painter , rather than critique the historical , social or psychological contexts against which he actually attempted to explore this virgin terrain of creativity.