Walter Langhammer went to India before World War 2, fleeing the Nazis in Austria. An art student at the time Oskar Kokoschka was teaching at the Viennese Academy, Langhammer had made friends with an Indian student, Shirin Vimadalal, who subsequently returned to India. After he wrote to her, she managed to persuade Sir Francis Low, editor of the Times of India, to appoint Langhammer first art director of the paper in about 1936. Adapting enthusiastically to his new home, Langhammer set up open house at his studio on Nepean Sea Road, and the young Indian artists who were to develop into the great names of the Indian Progressive Art movement would meet there on Sundays to hear his tales of the European art scene. Exhibiting regularly himself at the Bombay Art Society, Langhammer was soon surrounded by an 'in crowd' of fellow European Jewish refugees - professionals, artists, doctors and industrialists - who became important art patrons and accelerated the Progressive movement. Kekoo Gandhy, who was to found the long-running Chemould gallery of modern art in Bombay, recalls Langhammer's confidence that 'contemporary Indian art would make a mark and have an impact on the art scene . . . [He compared] it in terms of impact to the French Impressionist movement . . . referring to various schools - the Bengal school, miniature paintings, the influence of Indian sculpture. India had a great store of inspiration to draw from and the colours and light of India would make the difference.' Langhammer returned 'heartbroken' to Europe in the early 1960s, when his health deteriorated.
