Art Historian Gives Tate 50 Works Made in India Under British Rule

Tate, the group of British national galleries, has received a gift of 50 artworks made in India during the 18th and 19th centuries, a collection that brings together Indian and European artists working under the growing reach of British power in South Asia.

The works were donated by Charles Greig, a British art historian and collector who specializes in art from British-ruled India, according to a Tate announcement and a report by The Art Newspaper. Tate said the collection was built over four decades.

The gift spans artists from very different backgrounds. It includes the Indian painters Sita Ram and Ghulam Ali Khan, the European painters Johan Zoffany and Rudolf Swoboda, and the British landscape artists Thomas and William Daniell, according to both Tate and The Art Newspaper.

Three watercolors by Sita Ram stand out for Tate. They are examples of what are known as Company paintings, works made by Indian artists in a European-influenced style for British and other foreign patrons, and Tate says the gift brings this kind of painting into its collection for the first time. Both Tate and The Art Newspaper highlighted the Sita Ram works.

The collection also includes Swoboda’s portrait of a sepoy, an Indian soldier, from a maharaja’s regiment, painted around 1886. Tate says the picture was painted for Queen Victoria and is the first of Swoboda’s works to enter a British museum collection.

Tate said in a statement quoted by The Art Newspaper that the works shed light on a period of deep cultural, social and political change brought about by British colonialism in South Asia. Alex Farquharson, director of Tate Britain, said the gift would significantly strengthen the museum’s holdings of art produced in the British Empire. Mr. Greig said a collection built on a lifetime of study deserved to be accessible to everyone, and The Art Newspaper reported that he described himself as a temporary steward of the works.

A free display of the collection is planned at Tate Britain in London in 2028, according to both Tate and The Art Newspaper.

The works also carry a question of framing. Many were made for European patrons and show India through the eyes of the people who ruled it. Tate’s own description presents them as records of colonialism and its effects rather than as neutral images, and placing Indian artists such as Sita Ram and Ghulam Ali Khan alongside better-known Europeans gives visitors a fuller picture of who was making art at the time.

Mr. Greig recently appeared on the BBC program “Fake or Fortune?”, The Art Newspaper noted. Tate said the collection was given outright, without tax incentives.