Revealing some artists from India at Kew Gardens

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ALMOST AS SOON as English people began visiting India, and later colonising it, they took an interest in the flora of the Indian Subcontinent. Their interest was both scientific and commercial: looking for plants that could be exploited to make a profit. Many of the early English explorers of India’s flora worked in an era before photography was invented, or in the early days before colour photography became possible. Instead of making photographs of botanical specimens, detailed drawings and paintings of plants were created. Until I visited an exhibition at Kew Gardens, which runs until 12 April 2026, I believed that all the intricately detailed botanical images had been created by English and other European people.

The exhibition, “The Singh Twins: Botanical Tales and Seeds of Empire”, is divided into two related but quite different sections. One section contains colourful, contemporary artworks by the Singh Twins. The other, subtitled “Flora Indica: Recovering the lost histories of Indian botanical art” contains 52 botanical illustrations by Indian artists commissioned by British botanists between 1790 and 1850. Each one of them is rich in detail, delicately drawn and/or painted, and a delight to behold. Not much is known about the Indian artists apart from their names, and where they were based. The artists were both Hindus and Muslims, and their pictures combine traditional Indian draughtsmanship with the kind of scientific realism required by the English botanists who commissioned them. Compared to other Indians employed by British botanists, they were well paid, receiving up to £500 per month in today’s money.

Most of the Indian artists, whose works were on display were based in Bengal: most in Berhampur, others in Calcutta and Darjeeling. Other artists were in Burma, Saharampur, and Nepal. All of them were male. Over 7500 drawings of flora in South Asia were commissioned by the East India Company, and were created entirely by Indian artists. Some of these images reached Kew in 1879 from the Company’s India Museum, established in London in 1801 and closed for good in 1879.

The exhibition is well-displayed with informative labels. It is in the Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanical Art. This contemporarily designed edifice is close to the much older Marianne North Gallery, which houses a huge collection of botanical images created by Marianne North (1830-1890). Although her paintings are superb, those by the Indian artists in the exhibition have a certain delicacy that is lacking in many of North’s often quite bold depictions of flora.

The “Flora Indica” exhibition is showing alongside the Singh Twins’ artworks, which are imaginative, witty, and provide a satirical view of the consequences of European colonisation, particularly of India and Africa. Rich in floral details, the images complement those created much earlier by the Indian botanical artists.

Letters written from a princely state in India during the colonial era

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SOON AFTER READING “A Passage to India” by EM Forster (1879-1970), published in 1924, I read this author’s “The Hill of Devi”, first published in 1953. Forster made two visits to the Princely State of Dewas Senior, which ins in what is now Madhya Pradesh, not far from Indore and Ujjain. His first visit was in 1912, and the second in 1921. During the second visit, he spent several months as private secretary to the Maharajah of Dewas Senior.

“The Hill of Devi” consists mostly of letters that Forster wrote from India to his mother and other people. In them, he described the typical often extraordinary events he experienced in Dewas Senior. He also describes the people whom he met and with whom he worked including the friendly but indecisive Maharajah. The letters, interspersed with commentary, provide a view of what life was like in a relatively unimportant kingdom within British India.

The letters were all written before Forster published his “A passage to India”. In his book “The Hill of Devi”, Forster noted that he had begun “A Passage…” before staying in India in 1921, and tried to finish it while staying in Dewas Senior, but was unable to do so. He completed it after his return to England. The letters published in his “The Hill of Devi” contain much material that he later incorporated into hs “A Passage …”.

I enjoyed reading the collection of letters. Because they were letters often written in haste and, originally not for a public audience, they have an immediacy even though they are not the finest works of the author. Nevertheless, they were most interesting because recently I have visited the region in which Dewas Senior is located, and stayed in places that must have formerly been similar to that about which Forster wrote.

Laura Knight and a portrait of a woman from India

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APART FROM TEMPORARY exhibitions, the Royal Academy of Arts (‘RA’) in London’s Piccadilly has a permanent collection of works by its academicians. Amongst these pictures, there is a particularly fine painting by David Hockney. However, what caught my attention when I visited the RA today, 21 February 2026, is an unfinished portrait by the artist Dame Laura Knight (1877-1970). The sitter was Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit (1900-1990), who was born in Allahabad (now Prayagraj), and died in Dehradun.

vijaya Lakshmi Pandit by Laura Knight

Vijaya’s brother was Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964). She was active in the fight for India’s independence, and was imprisoned twice by the British. After India became independent in 1947, Vijaya had several important roles, including (to mention but a few of her appointments): India’s ambassador to the Soviet Union, India’s High Commissioner to the UK, the first female President of the United Nations General Assembly, Governor of Maharashtra, and Member of India’s Lok Sabha.

Laura Knight met Vijaya in London during the late 1950s when she was high Commissioner. As already mentioned, the portrait is unfinished. In an article (https://pooleyville.city/articles/laura-knight-a-panoramic-view) about Knight, Ellie M Brown, noted that because her portrait of Vijaya was left unfinished:

“… we’re left with the clearest sense of how Knight worked as an artist. Beneath the vivid colours that capture the dignity, femininity and strength of her subject, we see the loose, free-handed brushstrokes that plot out the foundations of the final piece.”

I wonder why the painting was never finished. Was it because her subject was too busy for many sittings.? Who knows? It was interesting seeing this portrait of an Indian person because we had just viewed the RA’s exhibition of works by Indian artists, “Mrinalini Mukherjee and her Circle”, about which I will write another time.

Tiles for flooring in India and worldwide: tapestry in cement

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WHEN WE WERE in Bombay in November 2025, we saw exhibition related to the Bharat Tile Company. Founded in 1922, this company produces cement floor tiles. It pioneered this manufacturing process in India as part of the Swadeshi Movement, which encouraged self-sufficiency as opposed to a dependence on goods manufactured abroad, notably in Britain. It was part of the road to Indian Nationalism and independence from British rule. Bharat’s aim was to produce high quality tiles that reduce or replace imports and meet the highest international standards. In this it was successful. The company captured the Indian market, and as its website noted:

“Our craftsmanship graces the palaces of Maharajas, Raj Bhavans, distinguished residences, prestigious hotels, vital hospitals, vibrant clubs, bustling offices, bustling factories, cooperative housing societies, esteemed educational and religious institutions, as well as busy airports and railway stations.”

The exhibition displayed the types of tiles, how they are made, their designs, examples of their usage, and how they have been exported to destinations all over the world. The patterned floors that can be created with these tiles, and there are many of them to be seen in buildings all over India, are described in the exhibition as “tapestry in cement”.

History of the sea and Falmouth in Cornwall

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I HAVE JUST finished reading “The Levelling Sea” by Philip Marsden. By describing many aspects of the history of the town of Falmouth in Cornwall, he not only brings the town’s colourful and important past to life but also gently introduces the reader to many facets of English maritime history.

I have visited Falmouth many times. This book makes sense of many things I have seen there. It has also introduced me to many features of the town, past and present, that I had not known about. Likewise, it has enlightened me on aspects of English maritime history that were new to me.

The book is well-researched, yet is not stolidly scholarly. “The Levelling Sea” is beautifully written. Although not poetry, its prose feels almost poetical.

Architecture as art at a gallery in Bombay

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OUR FRIEND GEETHA Mehra has her art gallery on 2nd Pasta Lane, near Colaba Causeway in Bombay. On one of our visits in November 2025, she had organised an exhibition, “Behind the Façade”, which consisted of works by the contemporary artist Teja Gavankar. The artefacts on display were almost architectural, some using brickwork and others containing other materials, As the gallery’s website explained:

“Gavankar is interested in dual states, in forms that appear rigid, where solidity gives way to softness and movement. A dialogue between natural and built environments unfolds, stemming from the artist’s experience of living in Mumbai’s suburbs. Gavankar observes the contours of the city during her commute, seeing organic forms emerge in its industrial undertones.”

Whereas architects make structures which are functional, Gavanka created architectural structures that were artworks designed to challenge the viewers perceptions of space. Seeing the brickwork sculptures and the patterned brick façade she designed for the gallery reminded me of the brick workshop we saw in progress at the Chitrakala Parishad in Bangalore a few days earlier (see: https://adam-yamey-writes.com/2025/11/20/bricks-and-design-at-an-art-school-in-bangalore-bengaluru/).

discovering forgotten cities in India and memorable archaeologists

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CURRENTLY MANY MUSEUMS in the ‘Western World’ are pondering over the idea of returning some of their exhibits to the territories from where they were obtained. A controversial example of this quandary are the fragments from Athen’s Parthenon, which are known as the Elgin Marbles.

From 1899 to 1905, Lord Curzon was the Viceroy of British India. In her book “Finding Forgotten Cities”, Nayanjot Lahiri describes how Curzon was concerned about preserving and conserving India’s many archaeological and historical sites, and promoting the work of archaeologists in what was to become the Archaeological Survey of India (‘ASI’). Concerning artefacts removed from India, it was Curzon who arranged for some ancient artefacts to be returned from the British Museum to where they came from in India. The most important thing that Curzon did in relation to Indian archaeology was to appoint the archaeologist John Marshall (1876-1958) to supervise and plan archaeological activities within the Indian subcontinent. It is Marshall and his highly trained colleagues including many Indians such as Rakhaldas Banerji, DR Bhandarka, KN Dikshit, and DR Sahni, who are important protagonists in Lahiri’s story about how the extensive remains of Harrappan (or Indus Valley) civilisation came to be discovered. The book also includes much information about the Italian archaeologist Luigi Pio Tessitori (born 1887 in Udine, Italy, died 1919 in Bikaner, Rajasthan), whose discoveries eventually contributed much to the unravelling of the mystery of Harrapan civilisation.

Apart from the above-mentioned, Lahiri describes the lives and archaeological work of a whole host of other people working in India. She describes how the earlier archaeologists were fixated on finding remains of places mentioned in early texts including the Vedas, classical author’s histories of Alexander the Great’s incursions into the Indian subcontinent, Buddhist and Jain sources, and accounts by early Chinese travellers in India. When the remains of what is now recognised as the very old Harrapan civilisation (as early as about 3000 BC) began to be discovered, it was gradually realised that these were not compatible with the stories written in the ancient texts. Although at first nobody knew the age of these findings, the fact that they were discovered deeper beneath the ground than the artefacts that could be dated, Marshall and his colleagues believed that they had stumbled on remains from a time far earlier than had been hitherto discovered by archaeologists in India. Amongst these and at various different locations, seals inscribed with pictograms or symbols began to be discovered. Later, these seals became important in dating the Harrapan civilisation.

Lahiri’s well-documented, scholarly account reads like a thriller. Not only does she relate the story of the discovery of the Harrapan civilisation and the archaeologists who found it, but also she tells of the difficulties that Marshall encountered ensuring that the ASI was adequately funded. And she tells of the remarkable way that the ageing of the civilisation became possible after Marshall had published his findings with many illustrations in the widely read, non-scholarly Illustrated London News in 1924.

I never believed that I would read a book about archaeology and find it un-put-downable, but Lahiri’s fascinating book was just that. It is a book that should interest both archaeologists and lay readers. I began reading it soon after revisiting one of India’s major Harrapan sites, that at Dholavira in Kachchh (Gujarat), and I am pleased that I did.

By Moore it moved from Chelsea to near Tate Britain

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RECENTLY I NOTICED a sculpture close to Tate Britain but not within it.

When the Chelsea School of Art – now the Chelsea College of Art and Design – moved from Chelsea to Millbank next to Tate Britain, so did this sculpture by Henry Moore (1898-1986). Called “Two Piece Reclining Figure No 1” and created in 1959, this was originally placed in the Chelsea campus of the art school, where for a time in the 1930s Moore was Head of Sculpture. When the college relocated to Millbank, the Sculpture moved with it.