Hyderabad: Noted city-based art historian Jagdish Mittal and artist Laxma Goud have been conferred the prestigious Gagan Abani Puraskar by West Bengal’s Vishwa Bharati University for their outstanding contribution to art.
They are among the seven eminent personalities across the country who have been selected for the award in the field of art. Sisir Sahana, principal of Kala Bhavan, Shantiniketan, said that Mittal (for 2007) and Prof. Goud (for 2012) were selected for the award and added that the others who had been selected were Ganesh Halooi, Himmat Shah, Nilima Sheikh, Suhas Roy and Vivan Sundaram.
President Pranab Mukherjee, the Paridarshaka of Vishwa Bharati, will be the chief guest and will give away the awards at the annual convocation of the university to be held at Shantiniketan on December 7.
“I am very pleased and thrilled at being selected for the prestigious award. The visit to Shantiniketan will bring back old memories. I had studied art at the prestigious school from 1945 to 1949,” said Mittal, who won the award for his outstanding contributions in the field of history of art.
The award carries a citation and a cash prize of '25,000. Born in Bulandshahar, Uttar Pradesh on September 16, 1925, Mittal obtained a diploma in fine arts from Kala Bhavan, Vishwa Bharati, Shantiniketan (1945-49).
The painter and arthistorian settled in Hyderabad in 1953. He is an erudite scholar, a passionate collector and a leading authority on Indian art. He was also the art editor of leading Hindi monthly Kalpana, (1951-73). He has several books to his credit co-authored with his late wife, Kamla.
Laxma Goud has also carved a niche for himself in the world of art. Born in 1940 in Nizampur in Medak district, Goud had completed his diploma in drawing and painting from the Government School of Art and Architecture, Hyderabad in 1963. He studied mural painting and printmaking in Baroda.
He covers a range of mediums from watercolours, gouache and pastels to glass paintings and sculpture in bronze and terracotta.
