Manju Kak talks to Shana Maria Verghis about editing a book on the Russian artist, regarded as a rennaisance man and a mystic, who taught us how to look at the wonderful Himalayas with new eyes
It was his images of the mountains that drew art-historian and writer Manju Kak to the paintings of Nicolas Roerich. She recently wrote the introduction to an interesting book about the Russian artist, who was a man of vision. He painted when the world was facing two great wars. A collection of essays titled, Nicholas Roerich, A Quest & A legacy (by Niyogi Books), features brilliant images – though few in number, by the man who spent the latter part of his life in India, operating from Kullu.
After he left Russia, Roerich (1874-1947), and his family moved to the US,a and then between 1925-28, travelled extensively through Asia, from Sikkim, the Karakoram, the Altai, Mongolia, Tibet. He painted many pictures of the landscapes, and leaves behind his huge images of the mountains, as well as many mystical people like the Dalai lama.
Roerich and his wife, were both Theosophists, who later formed a philosophy called Agni Yoga, which included certain practices from Buddhism, and was inspired by, among other things. The Vedas.
But what he leaves behind as the main legacy for India, which at that time, was still under colonial rule, was the return-to-the-roots sympathy.
Kak said he shares this in common with Tagore, who was another rennaisance man.
When he had been in Russia, the artist had early on in life had a fondness for older Russian traditions, and mythology. This was revived later under Perestroika introduced by the late Premier Mikhail Gorbachov.
Today there are 100’s of Roerich centres around the world that have created a cult around the man, who was not only a painter and a set-designer, for classics like the early productions of Rites of Spring and Wagner’s The Valykrie, but also a man who conceived a Peace Pact, before the Geneva Convention and even UNESCO.
Kak shared that she has a deep interest in mountain ethnography and also made a documentary on the subject. As well as having dealt with topics concerning the, “art and craft of the Higher Himalayas.”
She said, “It was Roerich’s mountain philosophy that has held my interest.“The book also has contributions by scholars and philosophers. I had done an exhibition about him not long ago.”
There is a mention that his wife was truly a fellow-companion, who was also a translator into Russian of Madam Blavatsky’s The Secret Doctrine.
Students and admirers of Roerich have sometimes likened the trip through the mountains, as a kind of mission that would herald a message of peace for a “New Age.” And that along the way, they carried with them a lodestone, that could have been a mysterious piece of an asteroid which had some symbolic significance. Moreover, the Roerichs also supposedly planted certain mysterious “magnets” along the path they took. “Though its not known whether these were merely metaphors. And not actual ones,” explained Kak.
She mentioned that Nehru had visited Russia before independence came to India, and it was there that he got the idea for a socialist system, with thoughts that he gathered from people like Roerich.
Manju Kak expressed that his influence on the contemporary Indian art sc ene is “not to be clubbed with other Indian artists. Because he remains in a niche unique to himself.”However his images continue to hold sway on the imagination of Indians and others, because they tell you to look at what’s within, instead of outside.
In fact it was Roerich, said Kak, “who told the Russians to send the Russian Eagle to the East. And to build bridges with nations like Tibet. Instead of mainly dwelling on the Francophonic influences. Because St Petersburgh was more inclined towards its Western counterparts.” But the other side was all the connection with the Older Russia.
If you look at the earlier figures that he has created, they tend to focus on the creations of victory goddesses and many images that portend a coming of gloom and misery. Because artists tend to reflect the sign of the times. later he was all wide skies and lots and lots of light.