The lush green Vallies of Kashmir with its rich nature and beautiful landscapes disturbed by terrorism and bloodshed.  There was one man Late Shri Bansi Parimu, an environmentalist and a self taught painter who put it all painstakingly and beautifully on canvas.

Bansi Parimu was a self-made and self taught artist, one of the very few painters that the valley of Srinagar has thrown up this century. He had a distinctive and individualistic style of ‘Abstract landscapes” which earned him a special place in the world of contemporary Indian Art. He had come a long way from the earlier realistic watercolours that had once thrilled him. More organic than geometrical, the modern abstractionism of his work was marked by his strong association with the valley, which remained the inspiration of his creativity right upto his death. Particularly enchanting was his use of fine gauze overlays, calligraphic and arabesque at times, which seemed to capture the changing pattern of light in the Himalayan pastures. His contribution as a sculptor, writer and environmentalist were also significant.

Bansi Parimu was one of the victims of the Kashmir turmoil due to which he had to leave his Srinagar home and come to Delhi.  He could not reconcile with his forced departure from the valley of Kashmir. Deprived of his home, its life and culture – he felt rootless and was haunted by memories of the lost paradise. In an alien city like Delhi, with unbearable summers, his physical ailments and mental agony further accelerated. Thus died Bansi Parimu, a refugee artist with a scar deep in his heart.

On this site, there is on display Bansi Parimu’s initial work, which includes landscapes of Kashmir – a selection of realistic paintings. Known for his abstract paintings, the beautiful colours of Kashmir transformed on to the canvas. After the breakout of terrorist activity in Kashmir, Bansi Parimu did figurative abstract paintings, which displayed the agony of Kashmir. His painting ‘Smeared Snows’ is a description of how the snow-clad mountains were bleeding. Depicting the Kashmir problem is also his painting ‘Red Knows No Creed’ through which he moralised that blood knows no creed and whatever be the caste there was suffering all around. ‘Exodus I’ and ‘Exodus II’ are figurative paintings of how people in Kashmir were fleeing the city.

Born in Srinagar in 1938, Bansi Parimu never completed his formal education. Yet, he turned professional as a painter in 1952 when he founded the Young Artistes Club. Subsequently he founded the Kashmir Art Society in 1957 and was on various committees including the J&K Academy of Art and Culture, the Faculty of Fine Arts, Kashmir University, and the J&K Board of Ecology and Environment. He was the recipient of several awards and exhibited in several parts in the country and abroad.