Jump to the 20th century: Gandhi and Jamini Roy (Lorie in India, Blog #2)

People might think I am crazy, but for me travel is actually Project Based Learning in the most active and true sense.  I have also realized that this is why I am so addicted to it.  At our elementary school, we begin with “building background knowledge”.  The combination of going to museums, looking at daily life today, seeing the architecture, eating and looking at markets/agriculture, and interacting with people, give the traveler an extraordinarily fast learning curve for background knowledge, especially when the place is one which I initially know little about.  The little studying I have done prior to the experience comes to life in a new way when it is embodied in its place. 

In our studies at school, we next do what is called “sensemaking”- discussing and mulling over what we have learned, and trying to make sense of it.  Crystal and I dialogue about what we see constantly, and question everyone we talk to- guides, people we meet on the street, and more.  Finally, we express it in some way ourselves (at school this would be the project or study).  For me, always, it is attempting to share it—this blog.  Please realize that this blog is an attempt at sensemaking by a true novice to India.  I realize there may be many inaccuracies, many of my own personal biases, and certainly a naïve point of view.  I welcome dialogue from anyone who reads this. I am also excited to imagine the innumerable ways in which I can share a trip like this at our school. 

We ended our first day with two more museums: Gandhi Smriti and the National Gallery of Modern Art.  We also learned that New Delhi is reminiscent of the mall in Washington, DC, in that the government is at one end and museums at the other end of a several mile long linear park, ending at the famous Gate of India, which looks like the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.  This makes it easy to visit several museums, and creates a lovely environment of tree lined parks on a large boulevard. 

Gandhi Smriti is a memorial in the place where Gandhi worked as a peacemaker, meeting with various factions, during the last 144 days of his life, and was shot walking to his meditation garden.  It is a very moving place.  The path which he took from his bedroom to the garden gazebo where was shot is reproduced in cement footprints, so we are encouraged to meditate upon his final journey. (see below)

The museum is interactive and high tech, yet celebrates Indian independence and self reliance through the spinning wheel and the salt march.  There is a small store on the property where one can buy local, hand spun cotton garments.  Making one’s own garments rather than relying on the British trade industry was a hallmark of Gandhi’s nationalist movement.

As one walks through the galleries, one at first sees Gandhi’s bedroom and sitting room/meditation table, with his few worldly possessions preserved.

One then goes upstairs to a series of exhibits in which an object, often some sort of spinning wheel, when spun, triggers a video to appear on the screen and explain the movement involved with this object.  In the case of the salt marches, which are like our “tea party” (the real one), in which a British tax on salt is being protested, one sifts through a pile of mock salt (tiny white beads) and when throwing them back in a bowl, triggers a video on the salt marches.

One moving video features various retreat centers which Gandhi built and participated in with others at different times of his life.  Its purpose is to show how his life philosophy evolved.  One center was in Phoenix, Arizona, and focused on the civil rights movement.  Another was a retreat center in India which focused on nationalism, but was built from exotic woods and was very comfortable.  His final one emphasized only local materials and simplicity.  His statement: “My message is my life,” was made very clear. 

Several monuments to peace and inter-group understanding are placed around the park at Gandhi Smriti (memorial).  One is a giant peace gong.  

Jamini Roy:  We also visited the National Gallery of Modern Art, where we saw a special exhibit on Jamini Roy, an Indian painter who lived from 1997-1972, hence experiencing the emergence of modernism and the independence movement in India.  Seeing Roy on the same day as Gandhi and the history museum was profound in several ways.

Roy began by studying in an art school influenced by European masters and the new impressionists, cubists, etc. in Europe.  Cubism is especially noticeable as an influence in all his work.  His early work is in oils and is part of these movements.

Later, Roy returned to his Bengal village and began to explore art as a form of national pride.  He was a supporter of and was inspired by Gandhi.  He began to express daily life in his village, yet to bring in other influences in ways he believed would be understandable to villagers.  For example, he did many paintings using Christian images interpreted through Indian images, in an attempt to “explain” the Christian symbols to his own people. 

He rejected European materials and began to make his own paints as tempra pigments ground from local rocks and extracted from local plants.  He also began to paint on cheap and local materials, such as cardboard or bamboo screens. In many ways, his art reminded me of the work of Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo in Mexico, who also tried to work through popular culture icons and themes.

Over his lifetime, Roy’s paintings began to simplify in a manner reminiscent of Gandhi’s journey.  He tried to express his ideas using simple lines and few colors.  His paintings also began to look more universal, for example, a simple line connoting a mother holding a child. 

An inspiring day!

At risk of oversimplifying highly nuanced subjects, Crystal and I felt that our day had fit together in a remarkable way.  The early history of India which included endless conquering by outsiders, ending with two hundred years of British colonialism, made the importance of the independence and nationalist movements of the 19^th and 20^th centuries profoundly meaningful.  One could see how the celebration of what is Indian  through self reliance on that which is local, natural, and simple- cotton, salt, natural tempera paint- took on great meaning.  Yet for Gandhi and Roy, and even earlier figures such as Ashoka, universal understanding, rather than national or religious factionalism, emerged as most important in the end.   All of these figures- Ashoka, Gandi, and Roy- had lives in which their ideas evolved and changed, sometimes abruptly, in response to their experience.  Gandhi’s social conscience was born when he was a British trained lawyer working in South Africa and was thrown off a train for having brown skin, regardless of his credentials.  Ashoka waged war, then peace.  Roy admired European art, then chose to celebrate the local images and pigments of his own country.  India is often seen as a country involved in spiritual journey and growth.  The figures it celebrates in its national museums exemplify for this message.