Untitled

"A painting is never finished. I work to reach a point where I can let it go."

The intensity of Datta Bansode's politically aware paintings may be traced to his first encounters with art as a boy in Latur. Bansode's first teacher was the artist and Buddhist monk Jagtap Sur. Using hardboard and enamel paints, Sur painted portraits of Buddha, Gandhi, Nehru, and Shivaji in a vivid, realistic style. "He was my first guru," says Bansode, "a good teacher of drawing and painting."