Abhijeet Bahadure

For me watercolour is love at first sight, you just fall in love with this medium. The transparency, vibrancy, fluidity and unpredictability is analogous to nature. I feel that it’s the most organic medium of all. It changes you as a person. It teaches you how to plan things, what to do if a plan fails, how to convert errors into something beautiful and how to be prepared for unexpected results and continuous surprises. How to accept failure positively. Above all it teaches us to enjoy the journey despite the hurdles and to keep going on. Even though I’ve tried various mediums the joy of watercolour is something beyond explanation.

How it all started
It all started with a summer art camp back in the 90s.It was organised by Local Art Group. I was fortunate to have the art camp in Nagpur. That’s where for the first time I applied a watercolour on paper. The joy of painting was so extraordinary that I still remember applying a pink watercolour on a lotus flower vividly. I was so influenced by the works of senior students that I used to gaze at them for hours. I remember almost every painting that was taught. It’s really helpful if you start at a young age as it develops your observational skills.

The next big turning point was when one of my father’s friend gave me a set of paintbrushes. I could feel the responsibility of it as it was an ‘Artist’s Brush’. From there onwards the journey of being an artist began. I started with regular sketching and painting, learning new things by experimenting with various mediums like acrylic, oil painting and watercolour.

In spite of such a good start I didn’t pursue arts. I graduated in Mechanical Engineering and Post Graduation in Marketing & Personnel Management from Pune University. After over a long span of 8 years in Industrial Marketing, I turned back towards my old passion of art especially watercolour. The good part about the journey was that I was still painting regularly and also learning, reading, observing senior artist works. I think that the continuous practice immensely helped me as an artist although I had to cover all the basics of art which is possibly taught in art schools.
Still I kept on reading, studying art literature and I suggest everyone should do so. Every time I read about art or study the works of senior artists, discussing with them, I feel like I know so little and I know that I have to keep improving and so the quest continues. Personally I feel that I should not be called as a self taught artist rather as a “Self Learning Artist “.I feel that art is something which needs guidance, inspiration and study of basics like any other field.

Traditionally Watercolour medium is more popular in western world and simple logics goes that it has evolved from there. Considering the difficulties of the medium and its unpredictable nature most of the artist takes up mediums like oil or acrylics. For the artist who takes up watercolour, Inspiration and reference comes from western artist and subjects and its but obvious. During my initial days I was fortunate to come across some good Indian watercolour artists who inspired me to represent more of India than the imitating westerns locations or scenes.
Fortunately the rustic or raw nature of Indian Scenes, like farms,villages ,rural house, coastal regions went very naturally with watercolour medium.
Another motivation is to represent our country and its beauty on international and national platform.
As an artist its quit challenging to abstract a good composition out of such rural or rustic scenes and that part keeps me inspiring.

I live in Nagpur with my family. My father Mr. Narhari Bahadure and mother Mrs.Shobha Bahadure always motivated me to practice art and always provided me with necessary tools and materials whenever I asked them for.My wife Priyadarshani is always the first one to see my new works and always pushed me to do better. I also get continuous encouragement from my brother Aditya and his wife Jyoti.
Family members are always your first viewers and motivation from them is really crucial in the journey of an artist.I am really Thankful to whole family. Special Thanks to my cousin Ritika for giving inputs, corrections for building this website.
But one should always strive to move forward and to continue doing things that they love. As an artist I would encourage you all to learn new things and keep an eye open for new things to come.I conduct regular workshops in my studio as well as online class.