People watching

People watching while waiting for a fare.

10″ X 12″ acrylic on canvas.

Fair game?

The teasing, taunting and sometimes worse that women have to endure while on the roads is a reality in quite a few cities in our world today. Many are the excuses that are given as if to say that in the saying it makes it alright. That she was dressed inappropriately, that she walked suggestively, she looked too pretty, she shouldn’t be walking alone , that men are hunters etc. etc. Makes my blood boil.

While, like this woman, you might feel like taking a stand, it would make better sense to ignore and move on. I blame cinema and violence for this increase of harassment in our country. Cinema because most of them show that a girl while initially resisting actually enjoys and falls in love with the youth who chose to accost her. And violence, as in the past, if a situation on the road went a bit out of hand you would have passers-by willing to help you. Now they too fear retaliation and violence from these goons.

The thought that ran through my mind while I was painting this was predators. In reality the lady was turning back to reply to her companions who were right behind her. They were taunting / teasing her too but it was as you would with friends and not strangers.

I have a great selection of references to work with from that one afternoon in Ashulia thanks to Anil’s photography skills and generosity. And having been there, seen these people, interacted with some of them has made it interesting to capture them with paint. This is the 4th completed painting in the Ashulia series which is being renamed “On the road to Ashulia”.

18″ X 30″ Mixed Media (acrylic + oil) on stretched canvas.

Waiting

The goal is visible yet seems so far away. “Waiting” was an attempt at getting away from the details and realism that I was getting bogged down with. Simplify, simplify, simplify was my mantra. It is my first complete painting in 2008 and the plan is to make a larger one based on this even though I hadn’t started out with that in mind.

10″ X 12″ oil on stretched canvas

Stop or else!

Tentative. Uncertainty. Fear.

Each of us has a boiling point and when we were younger we got there faster. Experience hadn’t taught us the lessons of self preservation, forbearance, good sense, patience as yet and we were not ready to listen to it from those who were wiser. Hot headed, hot blooded and extremely loyal, our actions took us to the point of no return and we made a stand for better or worse.

Was there fear, uncertainty – of course! And what did we have in our arsenal to fight with – words? Would it have made sense to deal harshly with us then? It seems not having had to take a stand on tough issues made us luckier that some of the youth before us and since. We got away lightly for whatever little misdemeanors we committed. I feel bad when i read about tasers, lathi charges, rubber bullets and what-nots. Seems too inhumane and unfair.

24″ X 30″ Acrylic on canvas

Wake up!

I think it is very childish of me but when friends and family nap in the afternoons, after a while I have this urge to go wake them up! I’m sure I must’ve done it too when I was younger but manage to restrain myself now!  She does look relaxed though doesn’t she?
This painting has been based on a sketch made while visiting my friend Sangeeta earlier this year. I took some photo references then and have used those to make this piece.

Nothing comes from nothing…

Nothing ever could…. or so I firmly believed. Actually, that is a bit of an exaggeration. I felt that I needed to learn a lot more before I could just sit in front of a blank canvas and start to paint.

I was given two challenges by my friend Sangeeta during my recent visit. One was to make an abstract piece and the second was to paint something without a reference. This started out as my attempt at making an abstract piece and then before I knew it it had turned into a face or at least what I thought resembled a face

Acrylic on canvas. Made the background first with a largish bristle brush and the face with a palette knife. Roughly 18″ X 12″.

Update: Aug 1, 2007 : Decided to get adventurous while framing my first painting. Lesson learned – tried and tested ways may be better I need to find a way to subdue the colour of the inner frame either with a rough coat of paint or with a mat insert. What do you think?

Too far to fix

The learning here was never to start something you want to take a lot of care with and make extra special, under pressure or with a new medium. I hope to make another one replace this one with in the near future. This one is now too far for me to get my hands on to change.

Acrylic on a 10 by 10 canvas. limited palette.

Here’s an incomplete digital painting from the same reference made quite a while ago that I like much better. Dont you?

Sangwit

Started this when I was stuck on the Portrait Project. It’s a portrait of a friend of mine and I’ve attempted her several times in the past two years. I’ve known Sangeeta since I was 7 and she has been the guinea pig so often as she is the most forgiving accepting of the outcomes.   While it still isnt quite there, this is the closest I’ve got to “getting” her and so I’m pleased with it.  I’m going to set it aside for a while and hope to come back to it in a few months.

I’m off to buy some art supplies and starting tomorrow, hope to do the exercises in Charles Sovek, Kevin MacPherson and Nita Leland’s books!

My first swap

A project that I am participating in involves exchanging paintings of portraits. Read more in A Portrait Swap.

Here’s a crop of the beautiful painting of me that’ll be here soon.

And below is the one I’ll be mailing out in a weeks time.  Finished it a short while back and now waiting for it to dry.  It’s 12″ X 12″ oil on canvas.

Baba – my first painting in art college

My very first painting at art college. This is my second oil painting. Surprisingly both were on large canvases. I was a little apprehensive when they asked us to get full size sheets to draw in the first week so it wasnt a surprise when we were asked to get a 30″ X 40″ canvas for the painting week. We collectively chose Baba over the other model for this as he would hold his poses better. With no pressure of grades or past performance expectations, I just let myself go and had fun. I had a bit of a problem with his face and asked for help. The nostrils and eye have been worked on by our teacher of that week, Ramesh. I’m very proud of this effort and like the colours and brush strokes. I can see now that I needed to work on defining edges.