Jamini Roy was one of the earliest and most significant modernists of twentieth century Indian art. From 1920 onwards his search for the essence of form led him to experiment with dramatically different visual style. His career spanning over nearly six decades had many significant turning points and his works collectively speak of the nature of his modernism and the prominent role he played in breaking away from the art practices of his time. Trained in the British academic style of painting in the early decades of the twentieth century, Jamini Roy became well-known as a skilful portraitist. He received regular commissions after he graduated from the Government Art School in what is now Kolkata, in 1916.

The first three decades of the twentieth century saw a sea-change in cultural expressions in Bengal. The growing surge of the nationalist movement was prompting all kinds of experiments in literature and the visual arts. The Bengal School, founded by Abanindranath Tagore and Kala Bhavana in Santiniketan under Nandalal Bose rejected European naturalism and the use of oil as a medium and were exploring new ways of representation. Jamini Roy, too, consciously rejected the style he had mastered during his academic training and from the early 1920s searched for forms that stirred the innermost recesses of his being.

He sought inspiration from sources as diverse as East Asian calligraphy, terracotta temple friezes, objects from folk arts and crafts traditions and the like. What was increasingly apparent from 1920 onwards was that Roy brought a joy and

Rejecting the academic style painting Jamini Roy introduced a new imagery and art practice representing the adivasis, the peasants and the ordinary villagers inspired by the folk arts of the Bengal region, the forms of which he knew intimately. The two paintings of Drummers is an illustration of the same.

Drummer I & II epitomizes the artist's fondness for the simplification of forms and the folk styles, both of which he evoked in his art practices. The drummers with their robust dignity are playful in their appearance and their simplified body form is executed with thick, black contour lines. Also the application of rich blue colour of the body against the bright yellow of the background creates a strong element of fantasy.