Q. What was your first encounter with Benares like?
"I spent a week in Benares in 1979 and found the city had the same organic quality as Calcutta. One evening I went by boat from Asi Ghat to Manikarnika Ghat and that was just superb drama. The ghats were shrouded in silhouettes with the bright orange sky forming the backdrop. Strange lights emanated from the tiny shrines even as the sound of the arati could be heard. I realised this was the experience I wanted to paint.
I thought of my father, a religious person who had passed away six months before, and imagined how he would have reacted to the place. I wanted to paint that collective emotional reaction to Benares."
- An excerpt from an interview of Manu Parekh conducted by Vidya Shivadas.