The intensity of Datta Bansode’s politically aware paintings may be traced to his first encounters with art as a boy in Latur. Bansode’s first teacher was the artist and Buddhist monk Jagtap Sur. Using hardboard and enamel paints, Sur painted portraits of Buddha, Gandhi, Nehru, and Shivaji in a vivid, realistic style. “He was my first guru,” says Bansode, “a good teacher of drawing and painting.”

His work shifted in focus after the 1998 nuclear bomb tests in India.
Bansode was struck by the irony of the code phrase – “Buddha’s Smile” – used by the government to refer to the tests. “After all,” he says, “Buddha’s philosophy is one of peace, and anti-crime.” In response, he began his Lord Buddha series. Bansode explains that “I wanted to show that Buddha’s birth happened here, but we have forgotten his philosophy.” Retaining a neutral palette, the series draws on the paintings of Ellora and Ajanta to depict the major events of Buddha’s life. The details of Buddha’s figure are inspired by the Mathuran and Gandhari sculptures of the Buddha.

As influences, Bansode names the work of Tyeb Mehta and Sunil Das, stressing the importance of the Indian tradition in his own approach to art.