... Early Cultural Writings An Answer to a Critic One had thought that the Ravi Varma superstition in India had received its quietus. Unsupported by a single competent voice, universally condemned by critics of eminence Asiatic and European, replaced by a style of Art national, noble and suggestive, it is as hopeless to revive this grand debaser of... The intention seems to be to represent Dr Coomaraswamy as an unknown man without credit in other countries who is trying to pass himself off as an authority in India. It is possible the disciple of Ravi Varma holds this view; if so, one can only wonder what Himalayan cave of meditation has been his cloister in the last few years of his existence! And what are we to say of this characteristic specimen... better from a Geologist, who naturally loves and is made to love everything rigid and stony." Am I to answer him in his own style by retorting that we cannot expect anything better from a student of Ravi Varma than theatrical wit and schoolboy impertinence? I prefer to suggest to him that manners which are allowed on the platform, at the hustings and in newspaper controversy in matters of political passion ...
... anywhere else than in the works of Ravi Varma. No doubt, there is a plebeian literature as well as a plebeian art which is simple to the extreme. These are the immature creations of the immature creator, who do not make a high claim to display in their creations. Neither do they have any ambition to do so. They express perfectly what they are. But in the painting of Ravi Varma there is an extravagant endeavour... for his creations are replete with vulgarity and they are spread all around like poisonous air. It is not that at present he lacks disciples and worshippers. Now who is that notability? He is our Ravi Varma. Curiously enough, his themes are mostly taken from the Puranas, that is to say, his heroes and heroines are the gods and goddesses. But what of that? He has seen them in his own light – with the ...
... immediate intuition. Partly this is because the new literature began in the period of foreign influence and of an indecisive groping, while art in India was quite silent,—except for the preposterous Ravi Varma interlude which was doomed to sterility by its absurdly barren incompetence,—began in a moment of self-recovery and could profit by a clearer possibility of light. But besides, plastic art is in ...
... Here in India things are and should be a little different. In spite of the modern European invasion and in spite of certain lapses in some directions – I may refer to what Sri Aurobindo calls the Ravi Varma interlude – the heart of India is not anglicised or Europeanised. The Calcutta School is a sign – although their attempt is rather on a small scale – yet it is a sign that India's artistic taste ...
... aesthetic sense have not been so much corrupted as killed. What more flagrant sign of this debacle could there be Page 578 than the fact that all educated India hailed the paintings of Raja Ravi Varma, an incompetent imitation of the worst European styles, as the glory of a new dawn and that hideous and glaring reproductions of them still adorning its dwellings? A rebirth of Indian taste supporting ...
... The Indian Fine Arts Critics", was published in The Modern Review of Calcutta (vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 207-13). The author of this article, identified by The Modern Review as "A student of Mr. Ravi Varma, the famous Indian Artist", made disparaging remarks about such critics as Ananda K. Coomaraswamy and Sister Nivedita. PART FIVE: CONVERSATIONS DEAD OF THE (1910) The first two of these ...
... Page 297 × For example, one still reads with a sense of despairing stupefaction "criticism" that speaks of Ravi Varma and Abanindranath Tagore as artistic creators of different styles, but an equal power and genius! ...
... Here in India things are and should be a little different. In spite of the modern European invasion and in spite of certain lapses in some directions—I may refer to what Sri Aurobindo calls the Ravi Varma interlude—the heart of India is not anglicised or Europeanised. The Calcutta School is a sign—although their attempt is rather on a small scale—yet it is a sign that India's artistic taste, in spite ...
... confined to a particular time and space. He is only archaeological in his outlook. He is likely to collect some materials for art but he himself cannot create anything of his own. The paintings of Ravi Varma can never be placed in the comity of the world, for we find there only the outer sheath, devoid of life. No doubt that sheath may awaken some curiosity for its grotesqueness but never can it touch ...
... woman. We see therein a sadhu's lock of hair and the bark for his loins and not his saintliness. If we judge from an artistic point of view then the pictures of the gods and the goddesses drawn by Ravi Varma are as ugly as the worthless novels of the street. Where there is only body and where we do not get the meaning of the body in some deeper truth behind it, the other-worldliness of the saint is an ...
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