Looking at Haren Thakur’s canvas, one can feel the beauty of the quiet, rust-red earth of Jharkhand. His imagery draws from the surrounding forests in his hometown of Ranchi. “Jharkhand can be found in everything I do. This place and my work are like symbiotic twins,” says the artist. Born in 1953, Thakur’s art is not created in sterile studios—it rises from the dust of his home and the contours of hills that cradle his village. His solo exhibition, A Moment in Modernity, is currently on display at Art Magnum in Delhi, and will travel to the Jehangir Art Gallery in Mumbai in August.
A student of the legendary Somnath Hore at Shantiniketan, Thakur carries forward the spirit of the Bengal School, yet grounds it in the visceral language of tribal life. His drawings—often just lines, but so alive they seem to breathe—capture the dignity of the everyday: a woman balancing water pots, a farmer stooping in rhythm with the land, a tribal dancer mid-spin, her limbs echoing the beat of the earth. Some line drawings will remind you of MF Husain. There is the similar economy of expression—with just a few deft strokes, he evokes complex forms and emotions. Ask Thakur about it, and he laughs it off. “Maybe it is similar, but if so, it is entirely coincidental.”
His medium is humble—Nepalese rice paper, charcoal, sometimes the muted glow of earthy colours. While Thakur draws inspiration from nature, his palette is nonetheless muted, unlike the vibrancy that is found all around. “I don’t think nature is always bright. There are colours—shades of earth, and even the various hues of the tree trunks and leaves—that are almost monochromatic. It’s how the light shines on the subject, giving it a softer sheen. That is what I portray in my works,” he smiles.
Thakur’s art does not romanticise village life—it lives within it. It pulses with simplicity. His figures are often faceless, but never without identity; they carry the weight of generations, myth and memory. His home in Ranchi is both canvas and cradle. It’s where he draws, teaches, and builds community. Through the Chotanagpur Art Research and Development Society, which he founded, Thakur nurtures young artists and preserves indigenous visual traditions. Art, for him, is a form of service, not spectacle. Has he never thought of moving to a metro where his art would be more accessible to people? “I believe my art is what it is because of where I am. If I leave this and move to a metro, my art will be polluted. It will no longer speak of the soil,” he says as he looks at a painting.
From the hushed halls of the National Gallery of Modern Art to the open skies of Jharkhand, Thakur’s work continues to move people—not by grandeur, but by truth. He reminds us that a line can be a lifeline, that the simplest stroke can tell the most profound story.