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Born in 1931, Shanti Dave lived in the village of Badpura in north Gujarat with his mother and brother. Dave started his career in the field of fine arts as a signboard and banner painter in Ahmedabad. In 1950, Dave joined the Faculty of Fine Arts of the MS University in Baroda, where he obtained both his undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in painting.

Today, Dave is know as much for his paintings as he is for his large murals... Born in 1931, Shanti Dave lived in the village of Badpura in north Gujarat with his mother and brother. Dave started his career in the field of fine arts as a signboard and banner painter in Ahmedabad. In 1950, Dave joined the Faculty of Fine Arts of the MS University in Baroda, where he obtained both his undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in painting.

Today, Dave is know as much for his paintings as he is for his large murals which adorn the walls of art institutions and public spaces all over the world. He was commissioned and flown by Air India to decorate its offices in Frankfurt and Sydney, but the fondest memory he has of a mural he painted is of the one in the VIP lounge of an airport in New York. Painted in 1963, this mural reflects Dave’s village upbringing and the tough times his family faced when he was a young child in Badpura. He remembers, "I was about five at that time. Our house was under confiscation owing to an outstanding debt and had been sealed. On hearing about the confiscation of the house in which there lived a poor woman with two small children, the Thakur lifted the confiscation. This stayed in my mind. In 1963, in New York, I visualized the Thakur era and I painted in it my wall painting. On February 5, 1964, the New York Times flashed a photograph of it titled Little Gujarat spread over three columns of the front page. It was my happiest experience."

Shanti Dave has held several one-man exhibitions in India and abroad since his first in 1957, and has participated in group exhibitions including prestigious shows like the South East Asia Art Exhibition in the Philippines, 1957, the International Graphic Exhibition in Switzerland, 1960, the Commonwealth Exhibition in London, 1962 and other international events in Japan, France, East Europe and the Middle East. Dave has shown his paintings in almost every Indian city and his work is part of many private and corporate collections of art all over the world.

This artist has been the proud recipient of a Padma Shree and the National Art Academy Award on three occasions in 1956, 1957 and 1958. Dave is a member of the Executive Board of the Lalit Kala Academy, and a member of the Sahitya Kala Parishad, both in New Delhi

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