Riaz Samadhan was born on the 4th of November, 1969 in Kolhapur He graduated from JJ School of Applied Arts with a Bachelor’s degree in Fine Arts in 1992 He got an Outstanding work award from his alma mater in recognition of the work done In that same year, he was also honoured with the Maharashtra State Award He received the Bombay Art Society award for two years in a row in 2001 and 2002 respectively and was awarded the Art society award in 2002 The artist explains that he has been working on the themes of perceptions, emotions, phenomena, queries, motivation, interpersonal relationships and the psycho-social ethos of his immediate world Through his work, he questions the perceived reality of things and aims to arrive at the truth His first ever solo show was held in 2002 at the Jehangir Art Gallery titled ‘Beginning’ Another important solo exhibition was the ‘The Diary of Riaz Samadhan’ held at the Museum Art gallery, Mumbai in 2011 This exhibition was particularly unique Riaz had strewn the entire gallery floor with brown dried leaves and the centre installation was just a set of daily objects that held a certain memory for the artist He recently also participated in the Busan International Art fair in Korea and the Florence Biennale, Italy in 2017 The artist strives to remain true to himself and this drive reflects in his works seamlessly