GOPAL  ADIVREKAR

Born in Devgad on the Konkan Coast in 1940. Adivrekar Studied at the Sir JJ School of Art till 1963. He held more than 36 solo shows including some in international locations such as Melbourne, Nairobi & London. In 1986 he received the National Award from the Lalit Kala Academy. He participated in numerous group shows including the IV & VI International Triennale & was appointed as commissioner for the VII International Trinennale. Awarded the “ Gourav Puraskar” of Maharashtra State. He was elected Honorary Secretary of the Mumbai art society 1987- 1993 & Chairman from 1993- 99. An abstract painter, Gopal Adivrekar has taken the art of non-figurative painting to a new high. His canvases are unforgettable creations of colors and floating mysterious organic forms. Born in 1938, in a small village Phanasgaon in Maharashtra, Adivrekar came to Mumbai and joined the Sir J. J. School of Art to complete his graduation in 1963. He then went on to chart a distinguished career as an abstract painter. Adivrekar was associated with the Lalit Kala Akademi, Bombay Art Society and several art organisations for a number of years. He has also served as an art designer with the Weavers Service Centre. His influence on the art scene has been two-fold: both as an artist and as an organizer. He was a master draughtsman right since he was studying in Sir J.J. School of Art. His specialty was the line, the fluency in which his pencil touched the surface and raced like a poet caught up in the spur of inspiration. In his vast universe of art all his surroundings turning into abstract, sometimes surreal forms to intangible lines into representational figures. Gopal Adivrekar had an original style – sophisticated in its interplay of light and shadow of terrains from his coastal hometown memories in Konkan have etched on to the canvas. Working with marble powder he worked with the preconception of density but while using textures over it, cut opens the composition for drama of chance and again finally using colors to bind the work. The results of which are irregular etched forms floating fractal but lyrically across the surface. There were several facets to his creativity, which had always surfaced through many phases of his art life and he kept subconsciously re-inventing through his paintings, sculptures, terra-cottas. He traveled widely & exhibited in France, Belgium, Netherlands, U.K., Italy, Turkey & Kenya. He lived & worked in Mumbai till he passed away in 2008.