○ Exhibits: A Collection of 49 Paintings by Tagore and Related Books

The National Museum of Korea presents “Paintings of Rabindranath Tagore - The Last Harvest,” an exhibition of 49 paintings by Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) and related books as part of the commemoration of the Year of the Korea-India Friendship.

Famous as the first Asian to receive the Nobel Memorial Prize in literature in 1913 with a collection of poems entitled Gitanjali, Tagore is widely admired in Korea for his poem, “A Light of the East.” He made distinguished achievements not just in poetry but in other areas as well, including novels, theater, music, dance, and painting. Tagore devoted much of the last phase of his life to art, painting in particular, and the paintings of this period that have been collected under the title, "The Last Harvest,” are great representations of his ideas.

This exhibition consists of four parts that are divided according to the objects he favored for his art.

The first part, “Imaginary Animals,” displays a collection of paintings capturing a variety of living things. These are largely imaginary animals that originated from ancient art while the second part, “Landscapes and Flowers,” guides visitors to the artist who began to be interested in various forms in nature. In the third part, “Figures Telling Stories in Gestures and Dramatic Scenes,” visitors are introduced to people displaying various gestures. In this period Tagore regarded the human body not as a simple form but as an entity containing a seed of drama that tell stories visually. The fourth part, “Faces,” presents a collection of various portraits.

The exhibition opens with a special event in which Rajeev Lochan, the Director of the National Gallery of Modern Art in India, and R. Shiva Kumar, the museum’s curator, give lectures. The lectures will take place in Lecture Room 1 in the Education Hall from 14:00 to 17:00 on September 20.

The exhibition is expected to offer art lovers in Seoul a rare opportunity to deepen their understanding of the life and art of Tagore, an artist who exerted a great influence upon Indian culture in the 20th century.

Portrait of Rabindranath Tagore