PORTRAIT OF JAWAHARLAL NEHRU

PORTRAIT OF JAWAHARLAL NEHRU 1936
Sanguine on paper, plywood, 50 x 40 cm
Artist’s signature and date (bottom left): BORIS GEORGIEV DELHI 1936
Inv. N 821
Concerning his five year stay in India Boris Georgiev shared that not only he crisscrossed the
country but he also learned Hindu and Sanskrit and got acquainted with many Indian leaders. After painting the portraits of Mahatma Gandhi and Kasturba Gandhi in their ashram in
Wadhra, he painted other eminent Indian personalities. One of those was the future Prime
Minister, Jawarhalal Nehru. In his memoirs he wrote about the portrait: I got acquainted
with one of Gandhi’s associates, a very intelligent and rather handsome man who had given up his privileged life as a Brahmin to become the most significant supporter of Mahatma Gandhi in the struggle for the independence of India and the rescue of the pariahs. Despite his more rational and less mystical beliefs that differed those of Gandhi, he shared the
ideals for non violence (ahimsa).
Devoid of any idealization, the portrait of Jawaharlal Nehru conveys true physical and
spiritual beauty