LIVELY HOME OF NICHOLAS ROERICH By Devashish Verma

Nicholas Roerich at work in Naggar. Photo courtesy: Nicholas Roerich Museum, New York)

8 June 2025. I walked towards the double-storey cottage nestled in the green hills of Naggar, where once lived Nicholas Roerich (1874–1947) — the celebrated Russian painter, also a writer, archaeologist, theosophist, and philosopher in his own right. He travelled the world, changed his views as he evolved as a person, yet remained a quintessential self—a rebel. He was a public figure who had much to say, much to paint, and, in the process, inspired a whole generation.

I, a 26 years old designer residing in demanding Delhi, was glad to be in Naggar. The weather was in perfect agreement with my mood—windy, sun-dappled, and neither hot nor cold enough to be noticed.

As I ambled through pine-lined paths, their tall shadows was falling like silent sentinels across the muddy trail, I felt deep solitude in communion with self. Somewhere — I couldn’t say when — a dog falls into step with me without fuss.

He does not seek my attention, only offers his reassuring presence. The kind of quiet companionship that makes the silence feel warmer.

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I could almost hear Roerich’s footsteps on the floorboards. He had said could communicate telepathically with his spiritual masters— ‘the Mahatmas in the Himalayas’ as he’d called them—through his wife, Helena, a mystic and a clairvoyant. Having experienced his art in his space, and his undiluted energy that hangs low like morning mist, I, too, could see through his eyes.

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Even before the cottage came into view, I felt something in me shift. And then there it was. Roerich’s spacious home, not palatial, instead, embodies a grace that comes with restraint, akin to his artwork.

Perched in the hillside like a thought held gently between the forest and the sky, the cottage seemed to breathe in sync with the breeze. The air carried the scent of cedar; specks of dust drifted and danced in the sunlight. White railings, wood-panelled verandas, and glass windows had been witness to the world change beyond recognition.

I pictured a tall, slender man with a glowing complexion and a saintly white beard on his conical face (like many of the Russian masters of the era, sporting a long beard was symbolic of a dandy freethinker) stepped out with brush in hand, inspired to paint the mountains.

After having travelled the world, during the later stages of his life, Roerich made Nagger his home. It was a significant venue of exchange of ideas, and art and literature, he was able to create a cultural-political hub in the bosom of nature. There were many significant visitors, the likes of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, who stayed here with his daughter, Indira Priyadarshini, in 1942. Now I was a visitor.

So much time had passed, though not much seemed to have changed. Inside, every room held onto its past, as an experience lived, beyond a mere spectacle. I got a sense that here time had taken a gentle halt.

The wooden furniture — handcrafted, wholesome, elegant in its simplicity — felt as if it was still in use, spoke to me. I had the urge to sit down, perhaps to write a letter to him about how I felt being here in his living space or sketch the mountains seen beyond the glass window, like he used to do.

I was integral to my surroundings, as if I had stepped into a Roerich painting. The cottage had been restored in a way that the past remained preserved with reverence. The bedsheets seemed to have been gently tucked in decades ago and left untouched since. The silence in the rooms wasn’t hollow—it was dense, rich with nostalgia. Standing there, I felt connected to him, his art, his lively lived space.

I could almost hear Roerich’s footsteps on the floorboards. He had once said he could communicate telepathically with his spiritual masters— ‘the Mahatmas in the Himalayas’ as he’d called them—through his wife, Helena, a mystic and a clairvoyant, as the folklore goes, she could see the future.

A small sign marked a corner: Roerich’s Study. A worn desk stood beside yellowing books lined up in a cabinet with French doors. On the table, by the window, an old typewriter sat upright; a regal Chippendale armchair to sit on and type. To me, this was not a museum. It was like a moment suspended in eternity—a still-life of a genius at work.

I lingered before his art—the paintings. His canvases were alive. They glowed. They hummed. They drew me in the way music does—you could hear the unspoken, witness the unseen. Roerich brushstrokes intuitively produced the right force and intensity. He didn't simply painted landscapes; he channelled his energy, and something was elemental about it.

I felt the chill of snow, the silence of monasteries, the gush of wind emanating from woods. There was one painting I stood longer than the others to watch, mesmerised. Colour bled into mountain forms, it felt like an undiluted, inevitable, timeless truth. In that moment, I felt like one, too.

Before leaving, I stopped at the small souvenir shop downstairs. A heavy lock hung on the door. Staff shortages, I was told. It was the only disappointment of the visit; I had hoped to take home at least a small print, something tangible to hold onto this ethereal experience.

The staff noticed my visible dismay. Roerich, perhaps in the subconscious, nudged them to change their mind and let me in. They unlocked the door. Yellow bulbs flickered to life. I leafed through stacks of prints and postcards as if flipping through borrowed memories.

The walk back was even quieter, I was overwhelmed by comforting nostalgia of an artist—it weighed on my soul. The dog was nowhere to be seen, disappeared silently as he had appeared; his comforting presence was missed.

The tall trees swayed, humming a lullaby to each other, and I found myself humming with them. Roerich didn’t just paint the Himalayas — he engaged with them, and they with him, a union of sorts well preserved in his paintings. Having experienced his art in his space, and his undiluted energy that hung low like the morning mist, I, too, could see through his eyes.