There are many mediums and types in painting like, abstract painting, composition painting, and realistic painting. Also, there are a lot of great artists working in this style in India. Great artists like Raja Ravi Verma, Deusgaonkar, Haldankar, SM Pandit, Baburao Painter were born in India, and they became immortal through their artwork. “But I love working in realistic painting because the artistry is so strong in it,” says Ratnadip Barbole.
He is a commercial artist (painter), who was fascinated by their paintings, so he chose this particular style of painting. Ratnadip has been working in this style for the last 15 years. Portraits, figurative, and landscape paintings fall into this category. His strengths are the realistic style of painting.
Ratnadip works with many mediums like watercolor, oil color, acrylic color, soft pastel, charcoal. Amongst these, he prefers to work with oil paint mostly. In oil color one can work on the same painting for a long time and give the desired result in the painting. He uses brushes thick and hard in oil color. He also uses linseed oil, turpentine, Camlin, or Winsor Company’s oil colors.
Before painting, the canvas needs to be stretched in a wooden frame. But there is a lot of variety in canvases like, Camlin, Picasso, Fine Art, and Linen. Everyone is using it at their convenience. Artists also need to be aware of these mediums. “It doesn’t matter what material or color you use; it matters how effective the work is and how you present it to the public. I contribute one hundred percent to my work so people love it more,” states Ratnadip.
An Artist Rising
Art is innate and it is a divine gift. Something similar happened to Ratnadip when he was in primary school. He was fascinated by the colorful pictures in the book. Then the pictures slowly began to descend on the slate-board. He started showing the pictures to Kamble Sir (an art teacher near Ratnadip’s house). “He saw the artist in me and started guiding me to draw in primary school,” informs Ratnadip.
After completing his primary education, Ratnadip went to Navbharat Vidyalaya in his village for secondary education. The special thing for him was that the art teacher who was guiding him, he was teaching painting in that school. In a real sense, this initiated Ratnadip’s plan in full bloom. “When I was in 6th standard, there was a taluka level painting competition at Kurduwadi, in which Kamble Sir persuaded me to participate. I got 2nd award in this competition. It was very appreciative of that success at our school,” tells Ratnadip.
It was very inspiring for him. This is where the seeds of his art career were sown. Kamble Sir worked to strengthen his foundation in the field of art in secondary education. He found the artist in Ratnadip and prepared him to take a great leap in the field of art. “That’s why I was able to reach the international level in this field of art,” shares Ratnadip.
Since he lives in a rural area, the subjects of Ratnadip’s paintings are based on rural areas. He has grown observing the rural life, which consists of bullock carts, and animals, etc. He grew up small and that is why he can present it effectively on the canvas. His art has a rural essence to it.
“I think a lot while creating any artwork, staring at the blank canvas for hours. I first draw a raw sketch on the paper, then finalize it and after that I start to draw it on the canvas,” explains Ratnadip the process of his painting. His mind is not at peace until the artwork is completed. He works without losing his appetite.
The only thing he keeps in mind is that it should feel very alive and vibrant, that’s how he works. People look at his artwork and think, did he really take these photos? The subject chosen for painting, attractive color combination and its coating, proportional figure are the rules of good art and Ratnadip makes sure that they are entirely his.
If people like artwork, it becomes famous automatically. What needs to be done is that the subject must reach people’s mind, which is on the canvas. The rural part of the attraction remains fresh in everyone’s mind and Ratnadip’s paintings feel very close to people. “My Indian beauties, love of sisters, bullock cart, motherhood, literacy, drops of love are some world-famous works that I have done that remain subjects of rural area,” claims Ratnadip.
An Artist’s Dilemma
After passing the art diploma, if one wants a job as an art teacher, they have to donate a lot of money. Being from an underprivileged family, Ratnadip faced a lot of challenges. His father sold their farm and donated Rs 4 lakh to an ungranted school. Ratnadip became a teacher in that school. But destiny had other plans for him. The school was shut down after two years and he lost his job. There was a rumor among the people in his village.
“What was the benefit of selling the land? The son scolded his father. How much torment must have been inflicted on the mind of a stubborn father? What would have been the state of mind of a person like me who dared to dream? The society did not have time to think about this. The society only got a topic to chew on,” shares Ratnadip grievingly. This incident was an inspiration for him to toss out the gossip and slander of people because he wanted to get rid of the thought that a son had thrown his father into a pit. “I stubbornly ignited and immersed myself in painting and continued to achieve success,” adds Ratnadip.
If the family situation is good, then it is easy for anyone to succeed. “However, if the family situation is poor and if your parents are working on someone else’s farm, you have to think a thousand times before doing any work,” states Ratnadip. That’s what happened to him. Ratnadip wanted to do anything to get his family out of this situation. While searching for a job, he was cheated of Rs. 3 to 4 lakhs by two people. He was completely disappointed and helpless because of this incident.
He immersed himself in art. Ratnadip chose his favorite medium oil color and started working under the guidance of Kamble sir. After three or four paintings, his own strength was calculated. Ratnadip made a painting called ‘An Indian Beauty’. In that painting, a woman was sitting near a tree with a baby goat in her hand, a pink sari on her body and a garland in her hair. he sent that painting to an online competition in London, and he was lucky that it got selected in the top 30.
This success brought his art career to fruition, and he decided to work full time in this field. Later, Ratnadip participated in many national and international exhibitions, and he was getting a lot of success. Growing in notoriety in the community, this led to paintings being sold at good prices, and the struggle he had to go through was actually, the end of an era for him. It was a new beginning.
Ratnadeep Barbole emerged as the famous painter. “This is where my professional art career really began. To date, there have been over a hundred individual and group exhibitions. I have received many state, national and international level art awards,” claims Ratnadip.
The art field is very expensive. Colors, canvases, and other materials are very expensive. Ratnadip and his family’s situation was very bad, he could not easily buy that material because his parents worked in the farm and support the family. Ratnadip’s friends helped him a lot during this time. With their help, he brought all the materials and started working.
It is a great tragedy that senior artists never inform junior artists about their performances and their share of success. “That’s what happened to me! I wanted to have success in the art field and get my family out of the struggle. I was trying to find out by going to different artists, but no one told me how to fill in and participate in exhibitions,” says Ratnadip. It is a fact that one artist never accompanies another artist. The biggest challenge before Ratnadip was to prove himself in the field of art and travel all alone.
If there is perseverance and confidence in the mind, then the path will be found, no matter what the field. “I went crazy and chased it. I started interacting with foreign artists through social media, I started understanding the art field from them,” he adds further. Korean painter Tono TP gave Ratnadip invaluable guidance. He participated in the competition in Turkey suggested by Tono and won the prize. It really gave energy to his art career, and it proved that Ratnadip was worthy to be in this field.
“You don’t get publicity and success unless you present your work effectively to the public. Your work is your identity, so work with devotion to the arts and you will definitely get success,” states Ratnadip calmly. There is no guarantee that the work one does will be sold, and this is a big challenge for professional artists. One must invest all their earnings in the painting. Selling a painting costs money because it depends on various factors. The only way to do that successfully is to make the work better and more popular. Then those paintings are easily sold. There are so many challenges for an artist.
Dynamics of Technology with Industry Overview
Currently, there is a lot of competition in the field of art. The number of artists in this field have increased tremendously. A lot of hobby artists are covering the industry. So, the work of pulling each other’s legs is going on right now. All of this has had a profound effect on the art field. The organizers of the show have made it a business. “We used to hold an exhibition in a small gallery and take a lot of fees from the artists and put their works on display,” shares Ratnadip. In such an exhibition, selling paintings was a long way off. This placed the artist in financial trouble and the organizers began to fill their pockets with money. The artists remained poor, and the organizer became rich. The current situation of the artists is so bad that it’s been two years since the whole world was fighting the coronavirus pandemic. During that time, the artists have gone into a lot of depression because, all the exhibitions were closed, the galleries were closed, the sale of paintings was closed, which resulted in financial crisis. Art exhibitions are a renaissance for artists. It is during these conjectures that the appreciation of their artwork comes, from which the new concept is given impetus. With all the galleries and exhibitions currently closed, new challenges are looming. It is very important to keep the mental balance stable. “I hope everything will be back on track soon,” adds Ratnadip in a hopeful tone.
Talking about the technological advancements in the art field, Ratnadip states, “if you want to reach the corners of the world, there is no better medium like social media.” Ratnadip’s cousin Prakash Barbole, who is currently working in CBI helped him a lot. He opened Ratnadip’s Facebook account and started uploading his paintings on it. Gradually, he became Facebook friends with many great painters from all over the world. Nobody guides anyone. But Tono T P, a well-known Korean painter, saw the difference in Ratnadip’s paintings and started guiding him through the comments. It was all in English.
Three or four months went by and one day, Tono Tipi asked Ratnadip to make a painting on Indian culture and send it to an online international competition in Turkey. “I immediately drew a painting of an Indian woman sitting and a goat’s lap is in his hands. I sent it to Tono and he was so impressed by the painting that he immediately asked me to send it to the competition,” shares Ratnadip. He sent the painting in the competition. His painting was selected in top 30 paintings in worldwide. It was not an easy task to get such a huge acclaim globally.
Then Me and Prakash uploaded this success story on Facebook with a testimonial. The post was seen by Kamble Sir’s daughter in Solapur. She told this news to her husband. He told this success story to his friend Parashuram Kokne. He shared my success story almost half a page in the Sakal News Paper. Besides, Dhairyashil Bhange, a journalist from Punyanagari News Madha, and Sandeep Shinde, a journalist from Divya Marathi, gave me good support. And this became the turning point of his life.
All this was made possible only by social media and other technologies. Even today, Google and social media, and his website receives numerous orders for paintings. In the US, Dubai, and Russia, his work has been sold through the internet. So, technology and social media have been a boon for his art career. “If you want to get publicity and sell your work, it is very important to be able to use this technology. It’s a boon for artists,” claims Ratnadip.
Advice for the Young and Steps towards the Future
Everybody is emerging with a different outlook and colors. If art is removed from a person’s life, one can only imagine how frustrating it can be. It is art that teaches you to look forward to life, to teach yourself to move forward and to make a mistake while standing at the same time, who is reprimanded by the artist. One must learn to use anything, increase their association with the people related to the subject, and they will find themselves motivated and able to cope with any situation.
“Learn to cope with the situation. Read and study new artists and study them works and try to create new ones. Increase your observation ability. Try new experiments in art,” conveys Ratnadip. “Success is not achieved unless we show our existence in the field of art. Immerse yourself in this field of art and work hard. Collect artwork and go out and see how much people will respect your work. But your work should be of that quality, you have to be impressed by your own work,” he adds.
Till date, Ratnadip has gained a name and fame by working hard in the field of art. He does not want to stop there. He still has a lot of work to do, He wants to do personal art exhibitions all over the world. Ratnadip also wishes to pursue a new concept. He wants to learn contemporary art.
“I am studying it, as it is new to me. Since I live in a rural area, I want to reach out to children in rural areas and guide them, for which I will always be ready. I want to convince people that this career can happen in painting,” shares Ratnadip. In the future, he wants to set up a very big studio in his village. “From there, I want to guide new artists and do my personal work, all the while helping my parents who have worked hard all their lives want to fulfill all of my dreams. I also want to be there for my wife along with my son Prajwal,” concludes Ratnadip.
