National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA), New Delhi, NGMA-01367
Location History:
The painting was created during Gaganendranath Tagore’s early Bengal landscape period. Its earlier ownership history is not documented in publicly available records. It is currently preserved in the National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi.
River View by Gaganendranath Tagore is a very calm and peaceful scene of a river in Bengal. In this painting, the sky covers most of the space and looks very open and soft. Below, we can see the river where some boats are floating quietly. There is also trees and bushes along the riverside, but they are not drawn with sharp lines, they look very soft and simple. The whole picture gives a quiet and little bit mysterious feeling, like everything is completely silent.
The artist did not use bright or dark colours here. Mostly dull and light colours are used which mix nicely with each other. Because of this, the painting gives a dreamy feeling like we see on a foggy or hazy afternoon. Tagore has avoided hard outlines, so the water, trees and ground seem to blend together. It looks like a light mist is spreading everywhere in the air, so the mood feels more important than small details.
He made this artwork using watercolour and wash technique. In this style, very thin coats of paint are added one over another so it does not look thick. The sky and river look very wide and light. The small boats and plants are placed nicely so the river looks deep and far away instead of looking completely flat.
This painting was created during his early time, before 1911. At the time, he was mainly painting landscape of Bengal and was also influenced by Japanese art like Yokoyama Taikan. We can easily notice their wash style in his work too. Overall, it is just a normal river view, but the soft shades and simple style makes it look very peaceful and nice to look at.
River View, painted by Gaganendranath Tagore between 1905 and 1915, is a soothing watercolor, wash, and tempera painting. It portrays a misty and serene rural landscape of rural Bengal. This painting has a vast sky, a tranquil flowing river, and mysterious woods on its banks. In the foreground, there are small boats that are tied to the river bank. The influence of Japanese wash technique on this painting can be seen through the use of a subdued color scheme and soft transitions in shades.
