By Sanjiv Goyal Featuring Ruma Acharya

In this article you will learn about:

• The Tagore Center Foundation
• Rabindranath Tagore
• Giving Back
• Abstract Painting
• Living From the Heart

Art the Great Equalizer

A Cultural Education Hub

Ruma Acharya and her husband started the Tagore Center Foundation in 2015. The mission of the nonprofit is to build a cultural touchstone on a 14-acre plot in Houston Texas. The arts and education center, which is still under construction, carries the spirit of its namesake, Nobel Prize-winning poet Rabindranath Tagore.

Tagore was a Bengali poet, writer, composer, philosopher, and painter of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. A household name in India, his poetry and other works are still largely unknown in other countries.

Ruma and her husband moved to Houston over twenty years ago. They are both philanthropists and avid supporters of the arts. Ruma found Houston a vibrant and diverse home. To her delight, the city’s citizens were enthusiastic about her vision of bringing Tagore’s unifying philosophy and teachings to life through building a cultural arts center.

Speaking of Tagore Ruma notes, “ His vision was above our understanding and he thought about everyone. He came from a wealthy family but he understood less privileged people. He was above religion, race, and color.” For Ruma Houston was the perfect place to plant the seed for Tagor’s unifying teachings.

This universalism is what the center represents to her. Though Tagore is very well-known in India, Acharya questions how much his philosophy is put into practice. She was curious how Americans would receive his teachings and philosophy. The enthusiasm she was met with fueled her passion to see the project through.

The arts center, once complete, hopes to provide a platform for underprivileged children and aspiring artists to be recognized on a larger scale. Recognizing the power of art and education, Acharya is creating a space for the benefit of generations to come.

An Artist at Heart

From a young age, Ruma always loved to paint. Multi-talented and a life-long learner she learned to play piano later in life. Her son went off to college and she didn’t want the instrument to sit there collecting dust.

When she was young she painted often and even won some awards, but when she went to IIT to study and then started her career she lost the connection to her inner artist. Now she has revived her relationship to the arts and to her own creativity.

Of all styles, abstract art is Acharya’s favorite. Abstract painting with its penchant for simple shapes and block colors may seem “easier” to execute to the untrained eye than say a still life, but it actually requires deep thoughtfulness and attention to detail.

Like the philosophical nuances in Tagore’s poems, abstract painting is allegorical. This is what Ruma likes best about it.

The Deeper Meaning

Ruma searches for the deeper meaning not only in her painting but in every aspect of her life. She believes there is an inner and outer dimension to everything.

When you first read Tagore his poems seem simple, the way an abstract painting may seem at first glance. It is only on the second, third, and fourth reading that the subtle metaphorical mysticism begins to shine through.

Ruma says, “It will touch the core of your life.” To understand what is below the surface, one has to spend time there and return over and over.

I’ve always believed that life is not about how many breaths we take, but about how many moments take our breath away.

Art creates many breathtaking moments. When you witness greatness in a song, poem, or painting, it cuts through everything. It goes to the depth of who you are because it lives in the essential inner dimension.

Inspiration

When asked which figure from history Ruma would most like the chance to visit with she gave a Tagorian response. “I do not believe in my past or my future. I live in my present.” However, I pressed her jovially and she humored me.

“If I could choose one person from all of history to meet with it would be my mother, who I misunderstood all of my life. She is my principal inspiration in my life.”

Often when we are with people we don’t realize the value of the relationship, and only when they are gone do we realize their profound impact on us which is measured by how much we miss them.

I’m not a great painter or musician but I am a great fan of people, art, and artists. Rembrandt is my favorite painter and if I could go back in time to meet anyone from history, he would be my choice.

After sitting with his paintings, when I close my eyes, I could imagine his brush strokes. I wouldn’t want to speak to him or interfere with his process in any way. I would just watch him from a distance, observing his mindset, how he moved his hands, and taking note of the environment he preferred to work in.

Never Stop Learning

Ruma was trained as a chemical engineer. When she started her own business she learned civil engineering. She learned so much about construction that she built and designed her own house. It was the only house on the block that didn’t flood.

She is personally interfacing with contractors and inspectors to see the completion of the Tagore Center. Her adaptability and openness to learning on the fly have made her successful in business and in her personal life. She has never stopped learning and expanding her self-concept.

“I have the appetite of learning. Learning in my life will never end until my last breath. I’m always learning.”

Service as A Mission

Though she has an exceptional breadth of experience and successes below her belt, you will never hear Ruma bragging. “I’m here for a purpose and that is to serve. When my day is done if people want to talk, they can.”

Her work ethic and the results speak for themselves. Ruma inspires admiration and affection from everyone she meets. She is truly an exceptional woman.

What’s her secret? Sincerity.

“Whatever I say, whatever I do, it comes from the bottom of my heart.”