Raja Ravi Varma

Raja Ravi Varma is one of the most recognized names of Indian art. This can be credited to his painting style – realistic using oil paints but most importantly it is his choice of subjects – the epics of India and his rendition of gods and goddesses. However, what made him a household name was that these paintings were accessible to all – by way of lithographic prints of his paintings. 

 

What gained him popularity also garnered criticism from art historians and artists. During the early decades of the twentieth century when the call for “swadeshi” was at its peak, Ravi Varma’s choice of using oil paints and a western realistic mode of painting was looked down upon, especially from the Bengal Revivalist Group. Surprisingly, even in 1993 which was the first time a major retrospective of the artist’s work was put together by art critic and conservator Rupika Chawla and artist A Ramachandran at the National Gallery of Modern Art, Delhi many artists condemned the exhibition with M F Husain being one of the artists! However, since then, there has been an objective analysis of Ravi Varma and his contribution and place in Indian art history is not contested. His works still draw crowds, in the 2019 edition of the India Art Fair one of the galleries showcased a single tiny painting by Raja Ravi Varma and people were queuing up to enter the room!

 

Ravi Varma was one of the first artists who set up his own studio, the first modern painter. He worked for the Maharaja of Baroda, Udaipur, Mysore and Travancore but never tied himself down as court painter. Yet, the Maharaja of Baroda built a studio to suit him when was painting for the family. He painted not only portraits but also episodes from the epics of Ramayana and Mahabharata.  Not only the typical court and wat scenes subjects that were hitherto not painted – Shakuntala, Nala Damyanti, Urvashi, Vishwamitra and Menaka which existed as common knowledge in people’s minds across the country. It is important to note that Varma had a direct reading of the epics in Sanskrit and Malayalam and that gave a better insight into picking the appropriate moment to depict in the painting. 

 

Such was the appeal and popularity of Ravi Varmam that he was also commissioned by Lord Napier, Governor-General of Madras 1867-72, Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Governor-General of Madras 1880 among others. Ravi Varma’s paintings were sent to exhibitions both in India and internationally and he won awards, Gold Medal at Madras Fine Arts Exhibition where he exhibited Shakuntala Pataralekhan in 1876 and in 1893 the World’s Columbian International Exhibition in Chicago and shown in Ethnographic Pavilion, this was sponsored by the Maharaja of Baroda and it was a suite of ten paintings with the descriptions written by Ravi Varma himself - Bride being led to the marriage Pandal, Kauravas of Southern India, Remembering the sister, Near the well, There comes Papa, A Muslim lady at the bath, At the bath, Malabar Beauty, Expectation, The Disappointing News, The Bombay Singer or Poverty. Ravi Varma received two Gold Medals and diplomas. Certificates of Merit citations. Raja Ravi Varma’s paintings since 1979 are considered as National Art Treasures. 

Raja Ravi Varma had stopped accepting commissions after the sudden death of his younger brother C. Raja Raja Varma in 1905.

 

Raja Varma assisted Ravi Varma in his commissions and was a painter in his own right. Ravi Varma’s last commission was for the court of Mysore and this time he was assisted by his son Rama Varma who had trained at the Sir J J School of Art. Ravi Varma passed away in 1906 at the age of 58. His legacy was continued by his son and his sister Thampurthi Bayi was also trained as a painter and a few of her paintings can be found today at the Chitra Kala Gallery in Thiruvananthapuram.  

 

In 2016, his work ‘Radha in the Moonlight’ became one of the top 5 most expensive Indian artwork, when it sold for approximately $2.6mn (Rs 23crores) in an Pundole auction. Since then his oil paintings have continued to attract high value buyers in Indian and International auctions.