“Honestly, it’s very early days in the journey,” Karan says. “Art provides a sense of belongingness. It allows you to make a space your own.” True to form, he immersed himself in research, subscribing to platforms like Artnet and MutualArt, and surrounding himself with artists, gallerists and friends like Udit Bhambri who provide counsel. “Karan goes into extreme detail when he’s interested in something, which can be painful and sometimes I get irritated because he takes so long, but looking back, the result has always been better than expected,” Shilpa points out. “I remember when we bought our first piece, I told him, ‘I could have bought my parents an apartment—are you crazy?’ But now I see dierently. A good work of art provokes intrigue. I’ve started appreciating colour, form and abstraction, which I never did earlier. Collecting art, in that sense, has been like a journey towards self- discovery. I’m a changed person in the last 10 months.”
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Shilpa cites their most recent acquisition—Akbar Padamsee’s Untitled (Nude) from 1987—as an example of her own evolution as a collector. “I was absolutely against nudes,” she admits. “I used to wonder, ‘Why would anyone want them in a home? Why would people pay for this?’ But now, it has become one of my favourite works. Art has trained my eye to look beyond the obvious.” Nalini Malani’s 2006 work Radha oers another example. “At first glance, it appears serene, but up close, it reveals a world of violence and struggle—blood, intensity, conflict,” Shilpa explains. “When I learned more about Nalini, her feminism and the way she explores evolution, the work took on deeper meaning. It reflects life itself: you can’t escape struggle or discomfort, but through them comes growth. That realisation has shifted not just how I see art, but how I think. To live with a work like this, to encounter it daily, is to absorb those truths unconsciously—and acceptance, I’ve found, makes the journey lighter.”
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