A Sketch from Album No 90

In this third sketch of a series of four sketches of ducks in the album, Nandalal has depicted a duck from various angles and studied its movements in simple line drawings. Nandalal had a strong affinity for sketching, his subjects being the surrounding environs, people in their everyday life or anything that he found fascinating. His sketches provide a moving record of the modest life and natural environment in which he lived. This album of 24 works from the late years of his career, largely records line drawings of animals and birds, with a few detailed renditions. Some of these subjects, he has executed repeatedly, studying them in varied postures. About the depiction of animals, in his book,' Vision and Creation', Nandalal elaborates, "Each creature has a basic spinal rhythm following its characteristic nature...A certain kind of movement or rhythm finds expression in the body of an animal following each emotional impulse, and this becomes for us its characteristic gesture... These body rhythms are based on the structure of the backbone, and this is seen most clearly from the side. The body's mass, structure and volume should be studied in relation with this life rhythm; it controls them and, in turn, is controlled by them." This sketch was signed and dated 'Nanda, 28.1.56' in Bengali in the top-left corner of the sketch with pen.