Aquarelle- Art Houz's watercolour painting exhibition explores themes beyond nature

From magnificent temples to rustic villages and vintage cars, the diverse themes for the paintings that will be on display at Aquarelle, the 15-day watercolour painting exhibition at Art Houz is sure to be a treat to the art lovers of the city. Featuring over ten artists from across India, the exhibition, beginning today has artists bringing their works that focus on a particular theme. “Watercolour, being a difficult medium to work with, most paintings we come across would be some random landscapes. In order to provide a fresh experience to the viewers, we wanted to feature artists who work on themes that are not very common such as vintage vehicles,” says Bridget Shibu, operations manager at Art Houz.

Landscape in to art

From finding olive green trees to skies in shades of purple to powder blue , artist A Rajas’s paintings speak for his love for nature and his unique way of portraying it through the sheer beauty of the colours he use. “If you want an exact replica of what is seen in nature, there is photography for that. When it comes to art, there is freedom to bring changes to the subject, be it in color, shapes or composition. Art can be inspired from nature but need not be extremely realistic,”says Raja who will have ten pieces of his work with the theme ‘landscapes of south India’, on display at the exhibition. A self taught artist based out of Coimbatore, Raja has been painting for the past 25 years and is proud to say that he follows the work of international artists such as Ray Campbell Smith to hone his skills. “For a watercolourist, I believe the most important thing is to observe his surroundings. Most of my paintings are inspired from what I have seen during my travels across India,”says the 45-year old Raja, who is also an interior designer and mural artist. 

Alive with shades

‘Full of life’, is a common reaction to Ramesh Jhawar's paintings as they possess certain spontaneity and vibrancy brought by strong elements of light and shadows. Numerous recognition such as the Palm Art award (Germany) to his credit, the Erode-based artist’s paintings are mostly depictions of everyday life and he will be featuring his series on life at Kolkata, Ahmedabad and Varanasi at the exhibition. “Like they say, beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder and I try to find beauty in the everyday mundane scenes that I come across,” says the 39-year old artist who loves to experiment with light and shadow to make daily life look dreamy and surreal. “Sometimes you have to let go of what you have planned, especially in watercolour. At the end what you have visualised might not have come but something even better would have,” says Ramesh who also said that he fine tunes his work over days till it conveys the maximum impact. Inspired by the works of Milind Mulick and Australian watercolourist Joseph Zbukvic, Ramesh believes that each artist has his own way of working and it would be an artist's biggest achievement if a viewer can recognise his style.

The other artists bringing their work to the exhibition are Alison Pinto (Mumbai) with a theme on peace and hope, Kancchn Haanday (Pune) with vintage vehicles, Karthikeyan Muringoor (Kerala) with expressions of temples, G N Madhu (Kerala) with works on nature, Mopasang Valath (Kerala) on rural life, Nithin NP (Kerala) with memories of motherland, Sooraj Babu (Kerala) on street life and Sunil Linus De (Kerala) on villages.

On till 7 July at Art Houz, Jenney's Residency

11am -7 pm

Free entry

Details: 0422 433 5777