It’s an exhibition, but it’s not really an exhibition: it does not conform to the idea of an exhibition. The works presented are artworks but perhaps they are not for the connoisseur. They are alluring, even wistful in a way, but different from the way we see art or what we imagine art to be.

Or at least that is what goes on one's mind when looking at Nar Bahadur BK’s spring series ‘landscapes’ at Nepal Art Council, Babarmahal. There are about 567 landscape works, a massive number to display, placed in alignment at the gallery’s ground floor hall. Some works are stacked in piles like in an art store, and placed next to them is just the price of the work and nothing more. There’s no brief statement for the artworks—they are what they are and there’s no facade to break.

Yet, you get drawn towards it.

“You can ask me to make your house amid mountains and stupas and I will try my best to make them for you,” says Nar Bahadur BK. Just like his works, BK is straightforward and dynamic.

“People know me best as a commercial artist and I don’t mind that identity. I very much love my work and the happiness I share with people,” says BK.

What’s even amazing to know is that BK works on five to six acrylic landscape paintings every day while simultaneously managing his gallery and taking requests from people. He is very swift with his brushes and knife. The secret he says is experience. “When you make mountains and hills for so long, you just know how it is done—consistency is what makes quality and it is what matters in art,” he says.

It’s been 23 years since BK started making landscape art—depicting the untainted beauty of Nepal’s aesthetic scenery. And the market is flooded with BK’s works, he says.

His journey started back in 1998 when he learnt making still life from his teacher Man Goldie in Butwal. He then came to Kathmandu—just to see where paintings of Bollywood movies were made. A Bollywood fan, BK wanted to see for his own eyes who was making the posters of Mithoon Chakravarty, Amitabh Bachhan and Hema Malini.

“I found out it was in Mitrapark and there I got a job. But of course, I couldn’t make the portraits of the actors, as I was still an amateur, but I made a lot of paintings for beauty parlours and salons,” says BK. “Then, as I was working, I found out about Lalit Kala College and enrolled myself to pursue art as my career.”

BK believes his interest in art came from his father who too used his free time to sketch in Nawalparasi. He was also fascinated to see the paintings in his teacher’s house. And for as long as he remembers, he always wanted to paint.

And by the time he was doing his Bachelors, he was sure he wanted to capture landscapes in his paintings more than anything. His hands too were quick at drawing the scenery of places he visited. So, he travelled around with his brushes and knife, sometimes he’d paint the Durbar Squares, other times Ghandruk, Itahari, Lumbini and other destinations in the west.

BK has by now travelled to almost every part of the country. He’s been to Everest and Annapurna base camps more than twice and to Mustang many times. About three years ago, he also travelled around the country with a metal pannier with his gallery’s and YouTube’s channel name highlighted: BK Art Gallery.

“I think social media is very resourceful, it helps with promotions and builds a network—I also started making videos of how I make my paintings, and in the future, I believe these platforms will help more artists in their journey,” he says.

His YouTube channel is filled with comments that praise the speed of his work and his brilliance. He has been proactive with initiatives and participates in almost every exhibition and opportunity and has won numerous awards for his art. He recently received the national artist award from Nepal Gharelu Tatha Sana Udhyog Nawalparasi Paschim, a quasi-governmental organisation.

“I believe you make opportunity for yourself when you are open to whatever comes your way. You cannot make a mark for yourself if you are not willing to open yourself to scopes around you,” he says.

And perhaps that is why he manages to sell over hundreds of his work by the end of each year. BK is an enterprising man: he will not let go of a good opportunity, and his works are affordable; prices start from Rs 5,000. His popularity and demand stems from how his works are so accessible.

For example, one time when he was travelling to Ghandruk, he received orders from hotels in the area asking him to make paintings of their cottage with the backdrop of the mountains. And he made the paintings too.

One time, he also sent his work from Jomsom, where he was travelling to make landscapes because his customer was flying back to the US and he didn’t want to disappoint them.

BK has never been exhausted from the process of delivering his works to people.

“My works are simple, I agree, but that is also why they are difficult. I try to capture beauty the most in my works because I want people to feel at ease when looking at them, I want them to unburden themselves from their worries,” he says. “But most of all I want my art to be accessible to everyone and I think landscape art is a starting point to understanding the diverse art field we have,” he says.

While landscape art was very popular back in the day, after the 1960s as artists shifted to modern art, it saw a vehement decline as the years progressed, says Madan Chitrakar, senior artist and art critic. “It declined with the misconception that landscape art was not really art, many considered it as a foundation to becoming an artist but didn’t see it as a form on its own. It was boxed,” says Chitrakar.

But in recent years, landscape art has slowly been reviving, as it has closely been associated with commercial art. But that has created a divide in how people perceive landscape art and other forms of contemporary and traditional art.

There is also no denying that for the general public, this art has remained more closed to the heart and more accessible to understanding what art is. Paintings like BK’s feel gratifying for their simplicity and nostalgia and hence there are always buyers.

Amid the changes in the art world, BK has remained adamant to pursuing landscape art in commercial ways and has been recording the change of landscapes in his own hometown, where huts have transformed into concrete buildings showing how times are changing. But according to him, the market for commercial art has strengthened, there are more artists pursuing this field and more people buying them.

“What I hope for this art is to get more recognition—I think the art form has been undermined,” said BK. “And if it is being undermined because it is commercial, then one should also understand that when art becomes commercial and accessible it evolves even more.”

The apprehension of seeing landscape and commercial art as art still remains a topic of discussion, but then there’s also the fact that one will never stop being wooed by the colours mirrored in a landscape painting.

“I think in time this perception will change too. People will see the significance of this kind of art,” says BK. “But at least for me, this work has always been important and will always be important. I want to make more landscapes and improve more. And I want to give it my all,” he says.