Lain Singh Bangdel was Nepal’s foremost artist, novelist, scholar, and preservationist. Born in 1919 in the teaestates of Darjeeling, India to an ethnically Rai family from the Khotang district of Eastern Nepal. He graduatedfrom the Government College of Arts and Crafts in Calcutta with a degree in Fine Arts in 1945. During his stay inCalcutta he wrote novels in Nepali, including Muluk Bahira (Outside the Country), Maitaghar (Maternal Home),and Langada ko Saathi (The Cripples Friend), the last of which is later known as the first realistic literature inNepali.
In 1952, Bangdel traveled to Europe and studied art in Paris at the Ecole des Beaux Arts where he developed closerelationships with other international artists including Indian artists Paritosh Sen, Padamsee, the Indonesianartist Affandi, and other artists of the Asian diaspora. Bangdel began to make a name for himself as an artist andintellectual engaged with the modernist movement. Yet, unlike many of his peers who felt the need to extractideas of modernism from their own cultures, Bangdel had no reservations about being at once modern andNepali. Evident through the artist’s continual work in both realistic landscape paintings and abstraction. In 1961,invited by King Mahendra to help organize the modern aesthetic movement in his home country, Bangdel finallysteps foot in Nepal, settling down in Kathmandu for the rest of his life.
In an essay titled “My Devotion to Art” written in 1980, Bangdel explains, “we can perceive this entire externalworld that our naked eyes can see in a tangible as well as abstract manner. This is because humans possess bothsight and heart.” Bangdel arrived at this view through his production of art in the 60s and 70s, painting bothrealistic depictions of the arresting Himalayan mountain range and the abstracted colors and forms stemmingfrom these landscapes. His decision is also partly due to the artist’s own notion as a “Nepali that is new to Nepal”,having not lived in Nepal until 1961. Bangdel hoped to simultaneously be accepted by his peers and to challengeNapalis’ preconceived notion of art. In the end, Bangdel’s work initiated a ripple effect in the Nepalese art scenethat can still be felt today.
