Indian Art and Letters

Author(s): India Society
Publisher: India Society

Page 15

India Society's Exhibition of Modern Indian Art Samuel Hoare, is here to accord to them a hearty welcome from the Govern. ment; and the Maharaja of Burdwan, a generous patron of Indian art, who will welcome in England the opportunity which this Exhibition is affording to his fellow-countrymen of exhibiting their work at the very heart of the Empire to which they belong.
Let me only add these words--that a very special measure of gratitude is due to Mr. de La Valette, the honorary organizer of this Exhibition, without whose powerful aid we should scarcely have found it possible to bring our enterprise to a satisfactory issue (Applause.) Also to Mr. Richter and Mr. F. H. Brown, the honorary secretary and the honorary treasurer of this Exhibition respectively, for the time and ability which they have devoted to the work of organization (applause); and to Mr. Lionel Heath and
F. H. Andrews, who shouldered much of the burden of arranging and cataloguing the exhibits.
Sir Francis YOUNGHUSBAND read a telegram from Lady Willingdon, expressing all good wishes for the Exhibition, and grateful and respectful thanks to the Duchess of York for her presence.
SIR WILLIAM LLEWELLYN: I would wish to add my voice to the welcome which is given to this Exhibition which you see here to-day. You have heard that it is the first complete survey of modern Indian art that is presented in this or any other country. It is right that London should be the first place in which such an Exhibition should take place outside India, that is to say. Great praise is due to those who have promoted it—to the India Society, to the Regional Committees which have gathered together the work, and especially, as Lord Zetland has said, to Mr. John de La Valette, the org
I am sure that English artists will be very interested in this Exhibition, and that should be to Indian artists, I think, a matter of concern. English artists have an opportunity on every side of acquainting themselves with art trends in Europe, but they have had very little opportunity of knowing what was taking place in India, and this Exhibition will from that point of view alone be of great interest to them.
In to-day's Times you probably all read the notice, which was, I thought, a very nice notice. It says that it proves that," practically all over India, the native talent familiar to us in works of the past survives and is well worth cultivating."*
That, of course, is a very, very important point. The tendency to-day is to communize everything, to universalize everything in all matters of life, and art does not escape. Means of communication, in fact all the modern inventions of which we are well aware, tend to make countries come so close
• The notice referred to appears on a later page.
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