CHENNAI: In her art studio on Khader Nawaz Khan Road, Kalpana Yuvarraaj’s office is surrounded by canvasses with half-finished paintings. The studio has artworks from various artists hung up all over the room from both established authors and her students, which she shows with equal pride. As the founder of the Artists’ Conclave Foundation, Kalpana will host a workshop today and tomorrow for aspiring artists by bringing in National Awardee Kalidass Jayaraman. The two-day workshop will focus on portrait painting using oil and acrylic paint on canvas and linen.
“It is a pleasure to work on linen, and it has a smoother finish. Fungus will not grow on the canvas, and it can be preserved for a long period of time. Then it can be preserved as a heirloom piece by our participants,” said Kalpana, whose studio also functions as an incubation centre for aspiring artists who have other commitments. She hopes that the workshop will help participants tap into their artistic potential and aesthetic understanding of their environment.
The workshop will have blind contouring and gestural drawing. The former trains artists to focus on a certain part of the face while painting and the latter trains them to draw hands in specific mudras. For this, Kalpana felt that Kalidass would be the best teacher to bring in.
“I would like to share the result of my experimental work of using acrylics as a base creating an abstract background incorporating glue gun (to create textures, water spray bottle to remove the excess paint). I use oil paint to create a portrait as oil creates a vibrated effect on matte-based acrylic,” said Kalidass, who will be flying down from Singapore to conduct this workshop.
Kalpana feels that sharing techniques between artists can help other artists, professional or amateur, improve, while Kalidass feels that the addition of mega art fairs akin to those held in New Delhi and Mumbai will help the artist community flourish.
The two-day workshop will be held from 10 am to 2 pm at the Artists’ Conclave Foundation office at Khader Nawaz Khan Road today and tomorrow. The registration fee is Rs 4,000. For details call: 9841024078.