Untitled (Festival of Lamps)

"Many of these reproductions were printed in Japan by the expert technicians of Kokka, a well known Japanese art periodical. The images were reproduced by Japanese woodblock printing method [...] Japan has a long tradition of woodblock printing, and Kokka color prints of Bengal School paintings are matchless in their beauty and technical excellence. The first thing that you would notice in a woodblock print is the total absence of those half-tone screen patterns with their constant disturbing suggestion that the image you see is mass produced by a machine. Next is the tactile sensation of the paper on which the print has been made. Unlike so-called art paper, which was almost exclusively used to print color half-tone reproductions, the handmade Japanese woodblock papers are much pleasant to touch. Combined with this was the superb skill of the Japanese printmakers, pulling each impression with perfect color registration" (S. Ukil, 'Kokka Woodblock Reproductions of Early Neo-Bengal School Paintings', Mukul Dey Archives website, accessed July 2022).

Describing the early watercolor painting on which this exquisite print is based, which is part of the permanent collection of the Indian Museum in Kolkata, fellow artist Ramendranath Chakravorty writes, "It is a very simple, yet a moving composition of great charm and mystery [...] Against the surrounding darkness of the evening, when the twilight is engulfed by the creeping shadows, a woman dressed in deep blue is seen to descend to the river, with a few lotuses in the left hand and a tiny lamp in her right. It is the illustration of a very well known and picturesque festival, in the month of October (Kartik), when every Hindu woman in upper India, steps down to the waters of the Ganges to float her votive lamp in honour of the Goddess of Fortune" (R Chakravorty ed., Abanindranath Tagore, His Early Work, Kolkata, 1951, pl. vii).