Rekha Hebbar Rao
Rekha’s lineage is impeccable as the daughter of K. K. Hebbar (1911 – 1996), a masterful artist and art educator. She grew up in Mumbai under the watchful eyes of her father, whose encouragement towards the art world came in the form of birthday gifts—colouring pencils and paints. Of her three siblings, Rekha was the only one who became an artist, absorbing all the art discussions near father and his contemporaries had within their home. What made the young Rekha paints. She began drawing at the age of four, and her growing collection of sketches was meticulously curated by Hebbar, who periodically sorted through them, discarding some and preserving others. Her first work—titled by her father as ‘First Painting ay Dekha, 1951’—was given to the Times of India’s art critic Rudy von Leyden, who offered to pay Rs 5 for it but Hebbar refused, saying that Rekha don’t need to learn about buying and selling at such a young age!
In a casual conversation, Rekha reminisced about her overpowering urge to paint simply because it brought her joy: I remember coming back from school, flinging my bag aside, and sitting down to make a painting. Her father would look at her works and nod, offering no critique except to encourage her to keep painting. Artist friends—including N. S. Bendre, K. G. Subramanyan, F. N. Souza, and P. T. Reddy—would often visit her father, inevitably discussing the art scene in Mumbai and across the county. Hebbar himself, with unfailing enthusiasm, attended art exhibitions every week. Immersed in such an environment, Rekha’s world throbbed with art, and her mind teemed with compositions waiting to take snape on canvas or paper.
