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Greetings to Nicholas Roerich

Rabindranath Tagore on Nicholas Roerich

”Your pictures profoundly moved me. They made me realise one thing which is obvious and yet which one needs to discover for oneself over and over again: it is that Truth is infinite. Wen I tried to find words to describe to myself what were the ideas which your pictures suggested, I failed. It was because the language of words can only express a particular aspect of Truth, and the language of pictures finds its domain in Truth where words have no access. Each art achives its perfection when it openes for our mind the special gate whose key is in its exclusive possession. When a picture is great we shouldd not be able to say what it is, and yet we should see it and know. It is the same with music. When one art can fully be expressed by another then it is a failure. Your pictures are distinct and yet are not definable by words – your art is jealous of its independence because it is great.”

Letter of Rabindranath Tagore to Nicholas Roerich,
London, 1920

Beautiful Unity by Nicholas Roerich

Foreword by Abanindranath Tagore

Nicholas Roerich has a place all his own in the world of Art. His pen too has carved out a niche for itself in the world of letters. The brush has a wider appeal no doubt, but the pen has a distinct function of its own; and in the hands of Nicholas Roerich it has for long exerted an influence which is at once elevating and instructive. A call to Beauty implies in its essentials an appretiation of the Vision which the Artist would fain share with the world at large. That the Artist s vision even when expressed in rhetoric can be quite as sincere as when it finds expression through line and colour and form is amply evidenced by what is set forth in this volume of essays. I am happy to find that in the following pages my friend Nicholas Roerich has voiced what fundamentally every sensitive mind feels abouat the values of Art including what is perhaps the greatest of all Arts – the Art of Living. In this he has indeed spoken for all Artists. I am sure the book will receive the recognition which is its due.

Santiniketan, 15-3-1964
Abanindranath Tagore

Dr. Kalidas Nag on Nicholas Roerich

”Our friend the great artist Nicholas Roerich is ever upholding the cause of Beauty even when the world appears to lapse to Barbarism. His thoughts on Art flow like his masterly lines depicting the Himalayas and we are grateful to him that he composed his colourful picture-epic of the Himalayan snow. Roerich is the first Russian ambassador of Beauty who has brought to India the deathless message of Art and we are ever grateful to him for his inspiring thouths and his loyal co-operation in bringing the soul of Russia and of India closer.”

Beautiful Unity by Nicholas Roerich

Jawayarlal Nehru's Tribute to Roerich

”When I think of Nicholas Roerich I am astounded at the scope and abundance of his activities and creative genius. A great artist, a great scholar and writer, archaeologist and explorer, he touched and lighted up so many aspects of human endeavour. The very quantity is stupendous – thousands of paintings and each one of them a great work of art. When you look at these paintings, so many of them of the Himalayas, you seem to catch the spirit of those great mountins which have towered over the Indian plain and been our sentinels for ages past. They remind us of so much in our history, our thought, our cultural and spiritual heritage so much not merely of the India of the past but of something that is permanent and eternal about India, that we cannot help feeling a great sense of indebtedness to Nicholas Roerich who has enshrined that spirit in these magnificent canvases.”

Nicholas Roerich Memorial Exhibition,
December, 1947 – New Delhi


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