S.Kalidas' Archive

Somenath Hore: Minimalist Genius

By S.Kalidas

Eminent sculptor and printmaker Somnath Hore died on October 1, after protracted illness in his idyllic and rustic home in Lalbandh village, Shantiniketan. Artists, art lovers and leaders of the CPI (M) mourned the passing away of the low-profile genius whose sketches recording the tebhaga peasant movement in Bengal first drew attention as powerful political art in 1946.  Leaders including the Communist Party patriarch Jyoti Basu, Lok Sabha speaker Somnath Chatterjee and West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya recalled that Hore had started making posters for the Communist party from an early age and that it was on the recommendation of the CPI leader PC Joshi that he was admitted to the Government College of Art and Craft in Kolkata.

Born in 1921 in Barama in Chittagong, Hore was deeply affected by the plight of peasants during the Bengal Famine in 1943. In the winter of 1946, Hore was assigned by the Communist Party to document the Tebhaga peasant movement in North Bengal. This movement of tenant cultivators demanded a radical revision of the crop-sharing system so as to reduce the landlord’s share of the produce from half to one-third. As critic Samik Bandhopadhyay puts it: “A young art student at the time, Hore witnessed the massive mobilization taking place in a network of villages, and captured the widespread spirit of peasant consciousness and militant solidarity.” His personal diary and sketches of those days, says Bandhopadhyay, “are an unusual social document of a peasant movement seen through the eyes of a committed artist. Closely involved in the struggle, the Tebhaga experience remained a source of inspiration for him. One can see in these sketches the rugged lines since transformed into sculptured forms, but charged with the same intensity of anguish and anger.”

From 1954 onwards, Hore started experimenting significantly with printmaking. Between 1954 and 1958, he lectured at the Indian College of Art & Draughtsmanship in Calcutta. From 1958 to 1967, he held several posts such as in-charge of the graphic section of the Delhi College of Arts, Visiting Professor at the M S University, Baroda and then returned to Bengal to join the Visva Bharati, Santiniketan as head of the graphic art department of Kala Bhavan. He was also a founder member of the Society of Contemporary Artists when it formed in 1960. In the 1970s he not only added sculpture to his opus but also attained much fame with his minimalist white-on-white paper-pulp series of prints titled “Wounds”. 

Pranabranjan Ray, curator and art critic, was associated with Hore for over half a century. They met due to their association with the Communst movement, and then stayed in touch due to their interest in art. Ray had gone to see him a month back, because he felt that Hore will not be there for long. He says, “We have definitely lost a significant artist and a great teacher. Not only is he one of India’s most versatile printmakers, but he, along with sculptors such as Mira Mukherjee and KG Subramanium, had ruled India’s sculpture scene. He had a deep commitment to the human condition all his life and that had shaped his artistic vision.”