Art

A bull. A ballerina. A Buddha. A baby T-Rex. And a big ant. All in one place. Frozen in steel - yet appearing to be in motion. These are but a few works of artist Kalyan S Rathore that are on display at ‘Active Canvas', Jayanagar I Block, till February 23rd, 2010 in an exhibition titled ‘Verbs in Steel'. Kalyan S Rathore with one of his steel sculptures. Pic: Deepa Vaishnavi.Industrial and Product Designing, Biology, Entrepreneurship, Ergonomics and biomechanical machines, Geometry, Contemporary Furniture are words that one would usually not associate with an artist, barring a few such as Kalyan…

Religious faith in a country like India is not a matter to be trifled with. If it doesn't actively move mountains, it does manage to move millions in population- physically and emotionally. India's multireligious identity provides for its secular political outlook, one that is questioned and turned upside down everytime communal tensions take over the public psyche. But we have to just look around us to see the things people d,o to assist their relationship with the divine. Fawzan Husain has done just that; in his exhibition of photographs at Tasveer, Kasturba Cross Road. He successfully captures the essence of…

A nifty escape route is all that we look for while rattling through the streets of Bengaluru to avoid the cacophony, the dirt and the dangers of it all. Quite the contrary, streets mean different things to different people, especially to intellectuals and artists who look at them as no less than theatre of life with a medley of dynamics on display - be it political, social, economic, cultural, or religious. The events explored a diverse set of issues on streets in India - from planning of streets, the politics of streets, appropriation of streets for religious rituals and so…

Colours swirl and mingle in echoes of the natural world – sky, ocean-beds, foliage and feathers – organic dreams trip lightly over real things, exchanging identities and producing new worlds. Anuradha Nalapat’s paintings are spaces inhabited by plurality – of thought, feeling and experience, of life itself.With a desire to place her art on common ground with the masses, she has made an attempt to open her exhibition to viewers. She wants viewers to share their thoughts, scribbles and writings and contribute to a session of shared discussion on Saturday December 19th between 5 PM and 6 30 PM at…

'There are melas and there are melas', says Ashok Vyas of the Grameen Art Blue Pottery Society, Rajasthan. Vyas is a blue pottery craftsperson who hails from Kotjewar, around 40 km from Jaipur and has been associated with the Kala Madhyam Mela since its inception in 2001.According to him, though cities like Bengaluru are today typically saturated with numerous crafts fairs right through the year, there are only a few that offer a truly meaningful platform to showcase the craft and the craftspersons. And he counts the Kala Madhyam Mela as one of these. Leather wall hangings - craft from…

Rows of lamps left out to dry at Pottery Town. The lamps are just waiting to be lit.  

The logo of Karnataka that I had noticed, was very good indeed:There's a "abhinaya mudraa" at the beginning, followed by a waterfall, a musical wind instrument, pillars signifying architecture, a palm tree, a jungle creeper, a temple gopura, then an elephant, and last of all, what has put Karnataka on the world map...the computer mouse!Someone has done an excellent job of the logo design! A heart-warming sign to come across when away from home!Today, I clicked this logo on the BIG 10 bus:If you notice, you'll see that the "BIG" is also "big" written in Kannada script on the diagonal...very…

A wall is a wall, whether it is plain, peeling or broken. But it is much more when it is painted with flowers, animals and mystical beings. It is street art. On Rest House Road, off St Marks Roads, one can see flowers, clouds and a man reading under a tree.Shilo Shiv Suleman, Siddharth Chadha and Ridhi D Cruz are the three young people who painted this wall. Ridhi is a Bangalorean, trained as a journalist, who freelances with independent media projects. Chadha who is from Delhi and Ridhi’s J-school classmate, is a film maker and researcher. Shilo is a…

Hampi – this word alone is enough to bring to mind pictures of grandeur, vastness, architecture, history and  destruction. The magnificant scenes of Hampi were captured  in more than 30 paintings by artist Ganesh P Doddamani. The paintings were on display and sale at Chitrakala Parishat last week. Artist Doddamani with his paintings of Hampi. Pic: Deepa Vaishnavi. Ganesh Doddamani, a native of Ramdurg Village in Belgaum, hails from a family of artists. He first began painting when he was around 12 years of age and further honed his skill in Shantiniketan, West Bengal. The peace and  tranquility there led…

That Bangalore is fast gaining recognition (long overdue, some may argue) as a hub for art related activities was further reinforced when ‘Art Etc’, a magazine of contemporary art and culture, published by Emami Chisel Art, Kolkata, was released at Chitrakala Parishat on  November 4th 2009.Dr Annapurna Garimella, art historian specialising in India, released the magazine. While addressing the gathering, she spoke about the importance of art journalism. She also spoke about the history of art journalism in India and mentioned about the trends in it during the colonial period and post independence (which saw the rewriting of Indian history…