Dear Reader,

Amidst all the tense talks of war, I find a quiet spot.

A blaze of blue and yellow before me is Zubeida Mahal. Beside me, the Parel Railway Colony. And in the distance, a fisherman’s boat floats gently on a light blue sea.

I am in Jehangir Art Gallery, in the heart of Mumbai’s Art Deco district, taking in artist Mena Malgavkar’s stories of the city. Her works—a mix of acrylics, watercolors, and pen-and-ink sketches—capture Mumbai’s little moments: laundry strung across balconies, the glint of a kirana store’s jars, ancient doorways and wrought iron balconies.

Here in this peaceful little art gallery—a quaint space that was once the café Samovar—I drink in views of my city: It’s a city I’ve lived in for thirty years, where my children grew up, and where beloved old buildings now suddenly vanish, replaced by towers named Arcadia or Beverly Heights.

In this gallery I see glimpses of a city that is disappearing before our eyes - a man sitting at Bhuleshwar Hardware Shop with sacks of rice and lentils, his wife behind glass jars of snacks; electricity wires trailing across the skyline; a goat at College Lane, Prabhadevi.

Admiring these views are the whole cross section of visitors that walk into Mumbai’s most prestigious art gallery - among them today, two college students, a family with a young mother and three children, an old man with a walking stick—each taking in the Mumbai scenes.

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Mena, whom I’ve known since she arrived in Bombay as the newlywed wife of our friend Ravi, previously worked in advertising at agencies like Rediff and Mudra. These days she teaches design at Atlas University and École Intuit in Mumbai and exhibits her works in shows in India and abroad, including Paris, Dubai and Qatar.

Today we sit on a bench in the gallery facing a canvas entitled ‘Lower Parel’. We chat about the literary influences that shaped Mena’s art - everything........

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