About S. M. Pandit
Sambanand Monappa Pandit was an Indian painter from Karnataka, popular in the school of Realism in contrast to the contemporaneous net-traditionalist Bengal Renaissance and other Indian modern art movements of his time. Most of his subjects oscillated between events from classical Indian literature including the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, the Puranas, and the contemporary cinema of his times. He infused a rare blend of artistic virtuosity and filmi glamour to his portrayal of romantic characters like Radha-Krishna, Nala-Damayanti, and Viswamitra-Menaka as also the many heroes and heroines of Hindi cinema. In addition to his critically acclaimed masterpieces he also illustrated many popular film posters, film magazines and various other publications in what can collectively be termed as calendar art. His works remain hugely popular even today. His mythological paintings and calendar art have been collected widely. He is also widely celebrated in the Indian calendar industry for his "realistic" depiction of themes from Hindu mythology. In these paintings he emphasised the physical forms of the heroes, heroines, gods and goddesses in marked contrast to traditional and classical styles of Indian painting. In his paintings, Pandit depicted his subjects as handsome, muscular, valorous men and sensuously beautiful, voluptuous women set in surroundings suggestive of cinema settings and sceneries. Dhurandhar known for his use of naturalistic techniques to depict scenes from Indian mythology, History and Classical Literature, a style he inherited from Raja Ravi Varma, and passed on to Pandit. They also became the first Indians to create painted show-cards featuring Hollywood greats, Greta Garbo, Norma Shearer, and Joan Crawford for the MGM. He was awarded a medal at the International exhibition in Toronto in 1944 for one of his cover designs. The exhibition of his mythological and portrait paintings in 1978 at the Ravi Shankar Hall and the Indian High Commission in London and Manchester won him popular appreciation and critical acclaim.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.