Stashes of paintings, framed and unframed, are spread across Gopi Gajwani’s sunlit home-studio in New Delhi. It is his space of quiet and calm, where he imagines and paints symphonies on canvas. “Every day is a new composition of colours,” he says, “You play within the forms, arrange them, like you arrange a musical score,” he tells us.
Sweet and unassuming at 83, he is revered as one of India’s foremost and most original abstractionists and loved for his sharp eye and gentle sense of humour. “I trained in graphic design, made cartoons and caricatures for many years before turning to painting,” says the artist, who has never been shy about exploring creativity in all forms, including photography and filmmaking. “You are the best teacher for yourself. You are the best critic for yourself,” he adds. “And when people don’t react the right way, that’s all right.”
In this BMW Artist Film, Gajwani gives us a tour of his expansive archive of paintings, posters, photographs and comics — and shares the wisdom collected over his lifetime.
Gopi Gajwani was born in 1938 in Sind and is represented by Exhibit320. He currently lives and works in New Delhi, India, and has shown at multiple editions of India Art Fair.