With the Cage

Abdur Rahman Chughtai is one of the most acclaimed and revered Pakistani artists of the twentieth century, although much of his oeuvre reflects a common South Asian cultural heritage. The artist began his training at the Mayo School of Art in Lahore in 1911. There he was taught by Samarendranath Gupta, who was himself a pupil of Abanindranath Tagore. The influence of the Bengal School is visible in Chughtai's early work, but what distinguishes the artist is his skill as a draughtsman. He portrayed famous personalities from Islamic history and depicted scenes from religious and Mughal texts, often in exceptional compositions rendered with characteristically bold, flowing lines. His etchings were printed in small editions and were rarely numbered. Chughtai visited Europe and came into contact with Pre-Raphaelite painting and Art Nouveau. The artist's virtuosic intricacy was afterwards also reminiscent of the prints of Aubrey Beardsley, whose dense linear designs had become very fashionable in both Europe and India at the beginning of the twentieth century.