Portrait of father, M. F. Pithawala

Portrait of father, M. F. Pithawala (1872-1937)

by Sorab M. Pithavalla
dated: 1935

Oil on canvas
30.1 x 24.2 in. (76.5 x 61.5 cm.)

Many artist children also took up portrait painting and earned a name for themselves in the art community. One such was Sorab Pithavalla, the second son of M. F. Pithawalla. He studied for almost ten years the art of portrait painting from his father and also won several awards and prizes at art exhibitions. He had the skill and a unique proficiency in translating the exact living likeness on the canvas. Both father and son had a command in genre depictions-the portrait, indoors, barn life, still-life-without ignoring the social. Their works have the props of a newly emergent bourgeois life that was gaining momentum in India.

Sorab did portraits of both his father and mother. This portrait of his father is on canvas whereas his mother’s portrait is in the form of a painted photograph.