Sallu-te to his talent

By: Upala KBR, Mid-Day
Monday, October 30, 2006
Salman Khan has a new love. It's painting. After trying his hand at scriptwriting and photography, the creative actor has now set his sights on the canvas.

Salman has recently started brushing up on his painting skills and has been taking technique lessons from painter Nilesh Vede for the last few months.

Some of Salman's portraits of still figures and human faces adorn the walls of his and his parents' apartments at Galaxy Apartments in Bandra. Salman has also started gifting paintings to some of his close friends.

Vede is hesitant to talk about his star student, "It's something very personal and Salman sir won't like it." All he admits is that he is coaching Salman and was introduced to the actor by a family friend. Salman's dad, Salim Khan, is more forthcoming.

"Salman has been a talented artiste right from childhood. It's something he got from his mother (Salma) who is an accomplished artist herself.

Our farmhouse is adorned by her paintings. She paints landscapes, still figures - anything that captures her fancy.

Neither my two sons, Arbaaz, Sohail or my two daughters, Alvira and Arpita are like me, they cannot even draw a line. But Salma's specialised talent has come into Salman. He has been painting since he was a child," says the proud papa.

Talented Sallu

Talking about Salman's painting lessons, Senior Khan says, "He always had the gift but now Salman wants to learn the basics and get the right direction.

He has the talent but he needs to hone it. Practice makes one perfect in one's craft. Salman's been taking a bit of help from Nilesh to go in the right direction on how to learn and improve on his craft."

Salman has been painting regularly and Khan says, "He has finished nearly 15 to 20 paintings already.

Salman keeps giving away his paintings to people who like them. He has given one away to Praful Patel and another to David's wife, Lalli Dhawan. I keep telling Salman that he should have a charity show of his paintings. People would love to see his art."

Choosing favourites

What is Salim Khan's favourite painting that Salman has done? " All of them are very good but one of my favorites is an abstract which hangs in my passage. It has images of people from different religious communities.

The first painting that he did was of his dogs, My Jaan and My Son. I loved that. He truly did justice to them. After that people encouraged him to paint some more and now he has taken it up as a craft."

Who is Nilesh?

He is a 25-year old successful artiste from Chembur who has done his diploma from the JJ School of Arts and a commercial arts course from the Raheja School of Arts. He has been painting for more than five years and has over 2000 paintings in his collections.

Vede who loves to paint Buddha in his various forms has held exhibitions of his paintings, the most recent one being at the Nehru Centre Art Gallery in May. Vede paints everything from landscapes to abstracts and still forms and has painting workshops.

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