Tyeb Mehta (1925–2009) was born on 26 July 1925 in Kapadvanj, in the Kheda district of Gujarat, and was raised in Mumbai's Crawford Market neighbourhood. He completed his Diploma in Painting from the Sir J J School of Art, Mumbai, graduating in 1952, and became an associate of the Progressive Artists' Group, founded in Bombay in 1947.

A versatile artist, Mehta freely engaged with the techniques and styles of modernist and avant-garde movements in Europe and North America — spending formative years in London from 1959 and later working in New York — while remaining deeply rooted in India's artistic traditions. Over the course of the 1970s and 1980s, his work increasingly turned to distinctly Indian themes, with mythological subjects, particularly the Goddess in her various incarnations as Durga, Kali, and Mahishasura, coming to occupy a central place in his imagination.

Beyond his numerous solo exhibitions, his work has featured in major group shows, including 'Multiple Modernities: India, 1905–2005' at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, USA; 'Freedom 2008 – Sixty Years of Indian Independence' at CIMA, Kolkata; and 'India Art Now: Between Continuity and Transformation' at the Province of Milan, Italy.