I'd like to describe an exhibition of paintings and sculpture that I went to last winter at the Jehangir Art Gallery in Mumbai. It was a group show by about a dozen young artists from different parts of the country, and I went with my cousin, who's studying fine art and had been nagging me to come along for weeks.
The first room was filled with large oil paintings, mostly of crowded city scenes, like packed local trains, street vendors and washing strung between buildings, but painted in bold, almost unrealistic colours. Further in, there was a room of sculptures, and that's the part I remember best. One artist had made life-sized figures out of scrap metal and old bicycle parts, while another had carved small, beautifully smooth heads out of dark stone, each with its eyes closed, as if the person were asleep.
My cousin was brilliant company, because she kept pointing out techniques I'd never have noticed, like how one painter had layered the paint so thickly that it actually cast tiny shadows. We ended up having a good-natured argument about whether the metal figures were clever or just plain odd.
Overall, I came away impressed. I'd always assumed galleries were a bit stuffy and intimidating, but this one felt lively and welcoming, partly because entry was free and some of the artists were there, happy to chat. What struck me most was how something as ordinary as scrap metal could be turned into something genuinely moving. It's made me more willing to visit galleries on my own.