In Solitary Communion

Till last week, Khanna was occupied with the publication of his biography, written by art critic Gayatri Sinha. And now he is back to finishing this canvas, the last of a triptych he has been working on for a buyer.

‘‘It is funny, one believes once one canvas is complete, the next one will be much easier. But it isn’t. Look at these three paintings, two of them match tonally but the middle one needs reworking,” he explains.

It has been more than 50 years of reworking for this staunch modernist who belongs to the first generation of post-Independence artists. Khanna looks back nostalgically at the early years. ‘‘We believed we were breaking away from all the rules of the academia. That is what modernism meant to us: No dos and don’ts. But now modern art is all about rules,’’ he says.

His bank job at Grindlays took him to Mumbai, where he became part of the Progressive Artists Group, then to Chennai, where he discovered Carnatic music and later, Delhi, where he worked in Garhi studios with J Swaminathan and Manjit Bawa. Ask him about the one thing that has changed in the art scene in all these years and he shoots back: ‘‘There are no debates today.’’ Nor the camaraderie the older generation shared. ‘‘Next month I am off to London to show my works and I will stay with Raza. He is going to introduce me to many of his buyers. I do the same for other artists. But I don’t think it will happen among today’s generation,’’ he smiles, layering the canvas with a grey to cool off the warm red.

The bandwallah has begun to take definite shape now. Khanna listens intently to all the things he might be saying. ‘‘All you have to do is work, and everything will resolve itself,’’ he adds, before withdrawing into the silence of his studio.