To celebrate the 150th anniversary of the birth of Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), the V&A will hold a display of about 50 of his paintings from the period 1928 to 1939, never before displayed outside India.

Tagore is best known as a poet and in 1913 was the first non-European writer to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Highly prolific, Tagore was also a composer and wrote the national anthems for both India and Bangladesh, as well as an educator, social reformer, philosopher and painter. In India, he is regarded as a national figure whose achievements are as important as those of Gandhi.
Tagore began painting relatively late in his career when he was in his sixties. Nevertheless he produced thousands of works and was the first Indian artist to exhibit his works across Europe, Russia and the United States in 1930. His painting style was very individual, characterised by simple bold forms and a rhythmic quality, and later served to inspire many modern Indian artists.

The works included in the exhibition are arranged around four themes of his oeuvre.  His first paintings are highly imaginative works, usually focusing on animals or imaginary creatures, which are imbued with vitality and humour. Human figures are depicted either as individuals with expressive gestures or in groups in theatrical settings. In portraits produced during the 1930s, he renders the human face in a way reminiscent of a mask or persona. Landscape subjects represent the smallest output among Tagore’s works, and this display will include four of the finest of this group.

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