He graduated from the Sir J J School of Art in Mumbai in 1890. Fascinated by the form of art of European and British artists, Mahadev Visvanath Dhurandhar began emulating the European Academic Art form. He painted a lot of figurative works and studies of people like Raja Ravi Varma. His works include more than 5,000 paintings and 50,000 illustrations. He joined the same school as a teacher where he earlier studied and later became the first Indian to be appointed director of the art school.