Sheikh Arif Bulbon :Gopal Ghosh was one of the founder members of the well-known ‘Kolkata Group.’ Proficient with several mediums, Gopal was adept not only with watercolour, but also with tempera, pen and ink, and brush and pastel. His economical technique of swift sweeping brushwork in Gopal’s landscapes was especially admired, including by the likes of India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. Among his contemporaries, he stood out, both as a draughtsman and as a skilled water-colourist. Gopal Ghosh was born at Shyambazar in Kolkata on December 5, 1913. Since his father served in the army, he spent his childhood shifting between Simla, Benares and Allahabad. It was as early as 1927 that his father recognised his son’s interest in visual art and gifted him John Ruskin’s ‘Elements of Drawing.’ Beginning with a pictorial language inspired by his tutor and mentor Devi Prasad Roy Chowdhury at the Government School of Art in Chennai, Gopal Ghose transformed during the 1940s. His sketches of the infamous manmade famine of 1943 and the paintings executed during his association with the collective Kolkata Group, testify his shift to a more contextually relevant pictorial diction. During the early 1940s he was based in Kolkata and taught at the Indian Society of Oriental Art. Later, he joined the Govt School of Art in Kolkata, where he taught till 1972.Bengal Gallery of Fine Arts in association with Indian gallery Akar Prakar organised a three-week long solo painting exhibition of Gopal Ghosh featuring the works of the prominent Indian artist. Veteran water-colourist, puppeteer and cultural personality Mustafa Monwar and noted theatre personality Ramendu Majumdar jointly inaugurated the exhibition. The exhibition, curated by Sanjay Kumar Mallik, has been organised to mark the 100th birth anniversary of Gopal Ghosh, this exhibition has travelled to the National Gallery of Modern Art in New Delhi and Mumbai, as well as Kolkata, with the release of a seminal book on his life and works. A total number of 103 artworks of Gopal Ghosh are on display in the exhibition. Gopal Ghosh travelled extensively within India to paint his landscapes. He taught at the Indian Society of Oriental Art, in Kolkata from 1940-45. He died in 1980. The exhibition will continue till October 18. n
