Ever since I first saw Wankhede's work, I want to return to it again and again which is one test of any truly meaningful work of art. I am fortunate to have a friend who has one of his works in her studio and I find myself needing to come back to it for reassurance that in the meaningless acrobatics and the flashy circus acts of a great deal of the current art scene in the city, that there are some who are continuing to follow their own unswerving path, free from the deduction of the market forces and shifting current trends. The work I'm talking about is a collage of raw cavas on canvas and it always seems to have the answer to any and all of the questionings and anxieties that I might be facing at that time. I spend some time with it and in its quiet perfection and ultimate simplicity, I find my bearings again and the world seems to make some sense again. - All the works of Wankhede that I have seen give me the unreal feeling of being the culmination and end result of a series of natural forces without the intervention of a human hand. The discipline, the training of a superbly honed sensibility is most definitely there, but the work ultimately looks effortless, like breathing or a heartbeat the ultimate result of the miraculously complex but invisible human machinery. The pieces of fabric, the few gashes, and slices, colour, line, handled and placed with the utmost restraint but with deceptive appearance of a natural phenomenon, like falling of a leaf when it's time has come for falling. The finished work is ultimately just there, unmovable, asserting it's own, very special place in the world. The work of art is pulsating there but it's creator has effaced its own personality and has withdrawn, distanced himself from the work. This, to me is the true test of a great work of art, unlike so much of current work that has the strong imprint of the artist smeared all over it. I want to see the work of art and not the boring individual who created it.

A man with a look as calm and quiet as the glass of his spectacles, always keeps gazing in the surrounding with an intensity and growing curiosity, which he ultimately justifies with a patient act on canvas that speaks for him. Though he has been living in the world overpopulated by ruthless competitors, polluted by their unending compromises, he remains strictly detached, thereby enabling himself to get involved in exploring the various materials which are unconventional in nature, but would suit his pictorial expedition. Thus over the years, with matured experience and cohesive pacing towards his aim, he has formed his visual vocabulary dedicated to silence in order to open an ear to the field of human vision. In his paintings one sees rags being transformed into colours, stains into aesthetic areas. Bandai not covering the wound but revealing the inner lustre of the feeling the artist has cared for. At one moment one can easily identify the material used by the artist to disclose his artistic merits, but such a state of identification does not last for long, as the same pushes further for an unusual stunning experience. He located and refers himself often to his surroundings, each thing minor or major, significant or insignificant becomes the instrumental device for his sojourn, He goes deep into his idiom and separates form from it's usual function while infusing in it the lasting aesthetic behaviour, simple and pure. He migrates from one object to another like an exponent or from one type of material to another like a researcher and thus carefully inquiring the unexposed possibilities for visual expression. Such a continuous migration has been his way of working for years, which he terms as Silent Communication, with silence inherited by all worldly elements. For him art material does not exist separately and therefore whatever is accessible as a medium, he uses with aesthetic inclination. The artist has remained a watch tower, undisturbed for years despite the rides and tides that have come and gone with changing times. You may not find his signature on the painting, but such a kind of absence speaks for the presence of the artist who has given to the painting his eyes, his breath, his blood, his yesterday, today and tomorrow, his joy and sorrow, all and everything except his name -- Vasant Wankhede- which was given to him by his parents and now once again by his paintings.