Re-discovering art inthe twilight of her life

To make a solo debut at 78 is quite a feat. But age has not deterred Uma Lohtia to showcase her art in public for the first time. Her first solo exhibition, ‘The living legends of Delhi,' where she pays tribute to the city's heritage, is scheduled for December 19-24.

The year 2011, marking 100 years of Delhi as India's Capital, inspired the Army officer's wife to capture the history behind the city, by painting 30-odd monuments in the metropolis.

Wearing the slight hunch of the elderly, Uma sits across the drawing room giving me a distant maternal smile, even as she recreates her journey so far — her natural love for a paint brush and how she sees meaning in the colour she splashes on the canvas.

“Till last year I had a very dilettantish attitude towards the art of painting. I would paint for family and friends to adorn their drawing rooms. I am not a formally trained artist; I have been my own teacher,” she says as she hands me a cup of tea.

Born in Khurja, UP, Uma Lohtia always had an artistic hand. She has been painting on and off for many years, ever since she attended a few evening classes at the Sharda Ukil School of Arts in New Delhi. After graduating from the Lady Irwin College in Home Science, she started painting for her sisters, brother, daughter, niece, and nephew.

Long-lost love

Being an army officer's wife, she confesses that she just can't let the activity quotient of her life go down. “I was engaged in garment business for the last 30 years, where I used to sell high quality embroidered garments. Unfortunately because of my repeated trips to foreign countries, I could not concentrate on the domestic end of the business and had to shut it down.” That's when she began focussing her energies on her long lost love — painting.

It takes an artist's eye to see inspiration in a twisted tree branch, and Uma has infused life and movement in those still monuments by adding human and animal figures, brushing them with vibrant greens, blues and red and catching that rare angle of destroyed tombs, imposing mosques and towering walls.

From Diwane Khaas to Red Fort, Lohtia has made the bricks speak their stories.

“Art is what flows inside. It is an expression of the blood that runs through your vein. It cannot be taught but needs to be cultivated through persistent ‘riyaaz,'” she reflects.

Confessing to be a deeply religious person, she wishes to paint the temples of India next.

“If God permits, my next set of paintings will be themed around the temples of India. I want to bring out the faith of mortals,” she confides. Not surprisingly, her pooja ghar shares space with her painting room, where she perches on a low stool next to the idols of Rama and Sita, letting her paint brush run riot with colours.

As her main door closes on me and I find my way down the descending steps, I realise that art, like love, sees no age. So in the twilight of her life, Uma rediscovers her ‘first love' for painting, and pursues it with the single-minded determination of a child who has just realised that she too can walk.

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