The museum showcases the best of Indian art dating from the 1750’s to the present. Our carefully curated collection of 17,039 artworks is one of the largest corpora of modern and contemporary Indian art under one roof. The scope of the collection representing 2000 artists is diverse and wide ranging. Apart from painting, sculpture, photography and printmaking, it also comprises masterpieces of digital and installation art as well as some rare decorative art memorabilia from the imperial Delhi durbars.
One can also view paintings from the Indian miniature tradition, works of European traveler-artists like William Hodges, Tilly Kettle, William and Thomas Daniells as well as paintings from the Company Period with fine examples from its provincial schools in Calcutta, Delhi, Patna, Tanjore and Mysore and so on. NGMA boasts of an unparalleled collection of artworks from the founders of modern art in India, the ten master artists- Raja Ravi Varma, Rabindranath Tagore, Gaganendranath and Abanindranath Tagore, Nicholas Roerich, Nandlal Bose, Jamini Roy, Ramkinkar Baij, Sailoz Mookherjea and Amrita Sher-Gil. Taking pride of place are works of artist collectives from post-independence India. The Calcutta group is represented by sculptor Prodosh Das Gupta, painters Gopal Ghosh and Paritosh Sen; Progressive Artists Group (PAG), Bombay by the radical artists, FN Souza, MF Husain, SH Raza, KH Ara, HA Gade and S Bakre. The collection also features paintings of modernists like Bhabesh Sanyal, Bireswar Sen, Balbir Katt, Ram Kumar, J Swaminathan, Anjolie Ela Menon, Arpita Singh amongst others. The repertoire of NGMA continues to grow to include some of the biggest names who have shaped the contemporary art scene in India.