Himmat Shah was born in 1933 in the historic Harappan city of Lothal in Gujarat. The early orientation of art came from his childhood home at Lothal. Hence, the artist’s long-term engagement with terracotta traces its roots to the place. After initially training as a drawing teacher at Sir J.J. School of Art in Mumbai, he studied painting at the Faculty of Fine Arts from M.S. University, Baroda from 1956 to 1960. He was a National Cultural Scholar in 1956, and received a French Government scholarship to study etching at Atelier 17, Paris in 1967. Shah has widely experimented across forms and mediums, making burnt paper collages, architectural murals, drawings and sculptures, though he sees himself as primarily a sculptor.
Himmat Shah&rsquo...
Himmat Shah was born in 1933 in the historic Harappan city of Lothal in Gujarat. The early orientation of art came from his childhood home at Lothal. Hence, the artist’s long-term engagement with terracotta traces its roots to the place. After initially training as a drawing teacher at Sir J.J. School of Art in Mumbai, he studied painting at the Faculty of Fine Arts from M.S. University, Baroda from 1956 to 1960. He was a National Cultural Scholar in 1956, and received a French Government scholarship to study etching at Atelier 17, Paris in 1967. Shah has widely experimented across forms and mediums, making burnt paper collages, architectural murals, drawings and sculptures, though he sees himself as primarily a sculptor.
Himmat Shah’s self-designed tools and innovative techniques give his preferred medium – terracotta – a contemporary edge. Shah uses a number of tools, brushes, instruments and hand tools to carve, shape and mould his works. He has designed and executed monumental murals in brick, cement and concrete. Shah was a member of Group 1890, a short-lived artists’ collective founded by J. Swaminathan.
The then Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, opened the group’s first and only show in 1963. It was a short-lived group and after its dissolution, each of its members, including Shah, continued their artistic practices within their own domain. Himmat Shah has a number of solo and group exhibitions to his credit both in India as well as cities across the world. He received the Kalidas Samman by the Government of Madhya Pradesh in 2003. Himmat Shah has also received the All-India Fine Arts and Crafts Society (AIFACS) Award, New Delhi, in 1996, and the Sahitya Kala Parishad Award, New Delhi, in 1988. In 2016, the Kiran Nadar Museum of Art held hammer on the square, a retrospective showcasing Shah’s famous terracotta sculptures, bronzes, and drawings, along with lesser-known murals, burnt paper collages and silver paintings.
