VINCENT VAN GOGH AND KASHMIRI ARTIST SOM NATH BUTT

  

VINCENT VAN GOGH AND KASHMIRI  ARTIST SOM NATH BUTT

In 1948, Syed Haider Raza, the well known Indian artist stayed for the full summer season in Kashmir. His stay was not only a big encouragement for the local artists but also resulted in the formation of the Progressive Artists Association led by Triloke Kaul, P.N. Kachru and Som Nath Butt.

Som Nath Butt remained Raza's favourite. To Butt, he taught what he had learnt apart from gifting a book that had paintings and sketches done by Vincent Van Gogh. Many visitors to Butt's house learnt much from that book. Amongst these visitors, some prominent names were Bansi Parimu, Umesh Kaul and Kishori Kaul. And Butt himself remained engrossed in that book. Like his precious paintings, Butt lost that book also due to his alcoholism.

                                                                 

    ( A MONOCHROME 'TWELVE SUNFLOWERS' BY VINCENT VAN GOGH...)

            ( A MONOCHROME 'TWO FLOWERS 'BY SOM NATH BUTT)

The Influence of VAN GOGH on SOM NATH BUTT is evident.

Raza was amused to see the aptitude, brilliance and drawing of Som Nath Butt. I was told by Pran Kishore (Radio Kashmir) that Raza used to call him LASSA, the pet family name of Som Nath Butt.

In 1948, S H Raza also did a watercolour portrait of Som Nath Butt that landed in the hands of a private collector from Hong Kong. Thereafter this portrait travelled to a Chennai art gallery and later in June 2018, it was sold in a Mumbai art auction for US$19800- approximately Rs13 Lakhs.

                                                                         

                                  ( Portrait of artist Som Nath Butt by  S H Raza )

During my research work for a book to be published shortly, I came to know that four paintings of S.N.Butt titled ‘The Houses’, ‘Landscape - I ’, ‘ landscape- II ‘ and ‘Autumn ‘ were acquired by the J&K Academy of Art, Culture, and Languages before his death but the fate of these paintings is not known. I also came to know that S.N.Butt had attended the October 1949 exhibition held by Progressive Artists Association in New Delhi. This was the first major art exhibition held by the Progressive Artists Association outside the state. This exhibition was inaugurated by Prof. Humayun Kabir. It was widely covered by newspapers. The newspapers described S.N.Butt as a 'wizard of colour combinations'. 

(Avtar Mota)


 
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