Gaganendranath Tagore

Gaganendranath Tagore was a great-grandson of Dwarkanath Tagore, a nephew of Rabindranath Tagore and elder brother of Abinandranath Tagore. Like other Tagores, he was also involved in painting, theatre, reading and photography. But he is best known as a cartoonist who created political cartoons and social satires on Westernised Bengalis. He was one of the most famous cartoonists of his times.

Contribution to Indian Art

Gaganendranath Tagore, along with his brother Abanindranath, is known for founding the Indian Society of Oriental Art in 1907. This society later brought out a journal called Rupam.

He was inspired by the visiting Japanese artist Yokoyama Taikan and other Far Eastern styles, early in his artistic life.

He is said to be the first artist to explore with the French Style of paintings in India.

He also came under the influence of experimentalist art prevalent in Europe at that time and was allured towards geometric compositions. This led him to develop his own brand of Cubism.

Thus, Gaganendranath, elder by five years to Abanindranath, shared his brother’s enthusiasm for painting, but not revivalism. He was interested in near-contemporary experiments like Cubism.

At the same time, their uncle Rabindranath Tagore committed to neither revivalism not Cubism, and in fact, he came out to be the first truly modern Indian painter, while playing the role of a patron by providing to painters a studio, called “Bichitra” at the ancestral Jorasanko house.