(Untitled) Santhal

Benode Behari Mukherjee, a twentieth-century Bengali artist, was a pioneer of Indian modern art. He studied at Visva-Bharati University, an international educational institute at Santiniketan, India, that was founded by the Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore, and travelled to places like Nepal, before moving to Mussoorie and then to Patna. In the year of his return to Santiniketan, he painted these watercolours of the Santhals (an ethnic group native to the country’s eastern regions), paying close attention to the individual figure whereas in his earlier works they had been framed against nature. In this artwork, a young archer is seen striding ahead, with his chest thrust outward, conveying earthly valour and strength.