The two-year pause imposed by the pandemic forced a Srinagar-born and Saudi Arabia-based urban planner to look at life and Kashmir differently. He started painting Kashmir from his memories of the 1980s and eventually decided to dedicate the first ever private art gallery to artists of Kashmir.
“There was not much to do during the COVID lockdown. My daughter in Dubai bought me paint and a brush. It took me to the beautiful locations of Kashmir that I visited in 1983 as part of my research project at the School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi. It was like rediscovering Kashmir as well as myself,” Iajaz Naqshbandi, 63, told The Hindu.
He was able to produce 24 oil paintings, mostly landscapes with serene, unpolluted and virgin locations. Many of them are already sold.
