Each artist enjoys experimenting with a different medium, is passionate about varied issues and finds expression through a variety of subjects and forms. Kynkyny, an art gallery in the city, which strives to give platform to artists across genres, is hosting Kaleidoscope, showcasing variety in art.
“Just like every seed can grow into a tree, every person has a moksh ke phool (flower of liberation) that can bloom. That’s the premise of all my paintings,” says Sujata Achrekar, a Mumbai-based artist, who enjoys working with acrylic on canvas.
Sujata has always been fascinated by figurative art, which reflects in her work too. “The man in my paintings is larger than life - it implies people’s potential,” says the painter, whose preferred palette consists of bright colours that’s symbolic of the brightness of life and living. Bold strokes of red on one side of the man’s head and blue on the other contrast with the light skin of the man’s face in her painting currently on display.
“I also like dabbling with white on white; it’s dull colours that I don’t like much. I feel they don’t agree with my idea of what life is or should be,” shares Sujata, who cites Indian traditional and contemporary art as her other influences.
For Gopal Samantray, another artist on display, art is more than art for art’s sake - it is about having a message for society. Through his paintings, Gopal expresses his angst against global warming and destruction of our natural habitat. The blues, blacks and whites as well as the absence of warm earthy colours conveys to the onlooker a sense of alienation of the zebra, the subject of his work featured at the exhibition, on finding itself in an urban landscape. “I also want to express the growing sense of apathy with regard to this. The portrayal is simple so that it appeals to the masses,” says the artist, who hails from Bhubaneswar, adding, “Sometimes anxiety takes over - if we exhaust natural resources at this rate and keep up the ecological imbalance, what kind of world will the next generation find itself in?”
Showing in Bangalore for the first time is 25-year-old Shikha Rajoria from Jaipur whose work is themed on children. “Unlike ours, their imaginations are not harnessed, and they go places in them. I find their expressions fascinating and also hope to, through raising awareness about the condition of impoverished children from across the globe, better their lives.” Shikha shares that she realised her passion for art at college when she had to ‘draw organs of the body’. She enjoys painting with acrylic or oil on canvas. “The colours I use depend on the mood I want to depict, but red, which stands for love and blood, and blue, as sky’s the limit for the kids’ imagination, feature most prominently,” she adds.
Kaleidoscope also features works of Ganapati Hegde, Basuki Dasgupta, Naina Maithani Kulkarni, Yuvan Bothi Sathuvar, Yolanda D’souza, Debabrata Sarkar, Chandan Chowdhury and Shikha Rajoria.
The exhibition, which opened on December 7, will be on at 104 Embassy Square, 148 Infantry Road, Above Ganjam Jewellers, Shivajinagar till January 14 at Kynkyny, between 10 am to 7 pm.