Chittaprosad Bhattacharya is India’s most recognized political artist of the mid-20th century. He preferred watercolor and printmaking, avoiding oil on canvas. Chittaprosad used prints to disseminate leftist ideas and propaganda.

Early life

Born in 1915, Chittaprosad became radicalized as a student of the Chittagong Government College in the mid-30s. He joined the grassroots movement to resist both colonial oppression by the British, and also the feudal oppression of the landed Indian gentry. Chittaprosad rejected the classicism of the Bengal School and its spiritual preoccupations. Due to his refusal to accept the discriminations of the caste system, Chittaprosad never used his Brahminical surname during his life. He wrote articles and produced incisive cartoons and illustrations that displayed a natural talent for draughtsmanship.

Career and Style

Chittraprosad’s most creative years began in the 1930s. He satirized and sharply criticized the feudal and colonial systems in quickly drawn but masterful pen and ink sketches. The artist/reformer was also proficient at creating linocuts and woodcuts with obvious propagandistic intent. Since these cheaply made prints were created for the masses rather than the art gallery, they were seldom signed or numbered. With time they took on value as art, and today are prized by collectors.

In 1943 Chittaprosad covered the Bengal Famine

Bengal famine of 1943

The Bengal famine of 1943 struck the Bengal. Province of pre-partition India. Estimates are that between 1.5 and 4 million people died of starvation, malnutrition and disease, out of Bengal’s 60.3 million population, half of them dying from disease after food became available in December 1943 As...

 for various communist publications. This resulted in his first publication, Hungry Bengal. It was a sharply provocative attack on the political and social powers of the time, and the authorities suppressed it nearly immediately, impounding and destroying large numbers.

Chittaprosad settled more permanently in Bombay from 1946 onward. The transformations that the Communist Party took between 1948 and 1949 caused the artist to disassociate himself, though he continued to pursue political themes in his art to the end of his life. In the years before his death, the artist devoted more and more time to the world peace movement, and various efforts to help impoverished children.

He is represented in the National Museum

National Museum (Prague)

The National museum is a Czech museum institution intended to systematically establish, prepare and publicly exhibit natural scientific and historical collections. It was founded 1818 in Prague by Kašpar Maria Šternberg...

, Prague, The National Gallery of Modern Art

National Gallery of Modern Art

The National Gallery of Modern Art is the leading Indian art gallery. The main museum at New Delhi was established on March 29, 1954 by the Government of India, with subsequent branches at Mumbai and Bangalore...

, New Delhi, Osians Art Archive, Mumbai, and the Jane and Kito de Boer Collection, Dubai.