An expressionist comes to city

An expressionist comes to city

Marvel art gallery plans to showcase Gujarati artist Natvar
Bhavsar’s paintings; most of them cost over Rs7 lakh

NRG artist Natvar Bhavsar is an arts graduate from CN College of Fine Arts
in city and had left home in 1962 to pursue higher education from the University
of Pennsylvania in America.Three years later, he wasawarded the John D Rockefeller
Grant, which earned him a membership of the New York school of colourists. Today,
after more than three decades have elapsed, every show that he holds today, takes
him a step closer to becoming one of the leading abstract expressionists.

One of the city’s wellknown art curators and an art gallery owner, Chaitya
Dhanvi Shah met the artist when he was in Ahmedabad last month. “Artist Natwar
Bhavsar visited our gallery and was impressed by the works we had in store. He
invited me to be a part of an international art show and wanted me to attend his
show in Hong Kong. Once I reached the venue, I found several consulate generals
and well known people in the art world present there.

The way the paintings were presented and displayed was fantastic. The
paintings were priced according to their sizes. A painting of 1 foot by 1 foot
was priced at Rs 7 lakh and the prices go up to crores,”confirms Chaitya.

Art consultant Anupa Mehta says, “Although I haven’t seen the recent
exhibitions by Bhavsar, his earlier works had certain elegance and a
studied restraint. His works also own a meditative quality that makes
them stand apart from fashionables.” Chaitya adds, “The most important
thing that Bhavsar taught me was to respect art. He said that only if you
respect art, will it respect you.”

Bhavsar is known to be very particular about his work He ensures that that
his stretcher corners are right angle only. He works up to 300- 400 layers of
colours in his works and at times it goes to 600 layers too, compared to other
India based artists who work only till 40 to 50 layers.

Inspired by the works of Bhavsar, Chaitya has decided to organise a show of
the artist’s works in Ahmedabad at the Marvel Art Gallery this year. “Although
it will take a lot of time to import his paintings from the US, we want to organise
a show of his paintings. His passion and sincerity even at this age (he is 77 now)
after achieving so much drew me closer to him as he inspires you, says Chaitya.”