Himmat Shah was born in Lothal, Gujarat, India. He lives and works in New Delhi and Jaipur. He was a National Cultural Scholar in 1956, and received a French Government scholarship to study etching at Atelier 17, Paris in 1967. As an inexpensive and versatile means of expression, Shah initially chose drawing to explore the relationship between form and space. Although trained as a drawing teacher and a painter, he has been working as a sculptor with plaster, ceramics and terracotta. He designed and executed the monumental murals in brick, cement and concrete at St. Xavier’s school Ahmedabad in the late 1960’s. His art explores materiality, texture and the question of presenting reality. Shah devotes great attention to every aspect that concerns his technique – along with aesthetic concepts and ideas that flow from his creative being. Through his work he explores the built-in obsolescence of consumerist society, yet often with a healthy dose of wittiness and irony.