The colours of realism

Madhoor Kapur returns to painting after a four-year hiatus.

Madhoor Kapur is back to painting after a break of four years, during which time he has released two books and spent time travelling between his alternate homes in Kasauli and Goa.

At his New Delhi studio, suffering the ravages of the recent rains, he's once more at ease as paintings are going back up on his walls. He's lost 10 kilos in the interim, and is indulging himself with meditation and yoga, having taken a holiday from another, earlier passion "" aromatherapy.

Kapur the painter has always been a significant presence in the capital, and his works have sold at Sotheby's and Christie's, and should soon find their way to a Saffronart catalogue.

But Kapur himself isn't too perturbed about either market or prices, having forsaken the traditional role of the gallerist to invite buyers over to his own studio and show them his works.

Nor is Kapur inclined towards large, impressive catalogues despite early success. Born in 1947, he was schooled at Woodstock in Mussoorie, and trained in art in Paris.

He experimented, in the sixties and seventies, with Impressionism, Dadaism, graffiti and kinetic art, and those who have works from this period should hold on to them because Kapur never returned to them once he abandoned these genres for post-modern realism. "I wanted to paint in the Indian context," says Kapur, about why he started experimenting with his large canvases, using oil and acrylic in fluorescent colours, "and I was bored with the Western idiom."

For several years now, Kapur has travelled extensively in India, returning periodically to Rajasthan and to Orissa, to Tamil Nadu and to Madhya Pradesh with his trusted camera as his most faithful companion.

"Critics are upset when they learn that I take pictures and then draw my paintings," he laughs, "so these days I say I also use video and sketches," "" he takes a dig at experimental new art "" "and they're okay with that."

He has been painting some of those collective images from his travels once again now, in his studio in Kasauli. It's difficult to marry his 4'x6' canvases rainbowed with a huddle of figures in a bazaar with his isolation in Kasauli with its rain-drenched greens, but Kapur is a meticulous artist, completely focused in his work.

"It can take me as long as two months to complete a painting," he says, "though a better average would be one painting a month."

That's when he isn't travelling, writing, or meeting friends and inviting them over for lunch. Critics haven't been kind to Kapur, savaging his work for its decorative element.

"I'd grown beyond abstraction," says Kapur wearily, "I find the nature of realism very important, which is why I choose very ordinary people for my canvases, not those with a Madonna-like beauty."

Since he's personally supervised his shows, and isn't currently engaged in any more solo showings, he's been able to keep a firm handle on his prices. But it's also a reason why his prices haven't fluctuated wildly in the market.

"But only the richies buy my works," he says almost comically, "collectors forget I have smaller works that sell for as little as Rs 25,000." of course, they're really small works.

As for the manner in which his market has risen, a handy comparison is his own list of prices from his 27th solo show in 1986. The cheapest work on the list is priced at Rs 39,000, the most expensive at Rs 56,000.

At that point, these were considered expensive. Now, with his average-sized works (his 4'x6' canvases) posted for Rs 10-12 lakh (and he has paintings twice that size), Kapur has proved to be as buoyant as the real estate market.