Servite Children's Home.mp4

Commanding Strokes

DR. ASHRAFI S. BHAGAT

A charity show titled art aids… in collaboration with Apparao Galleries Chennai, INBOX 1305, alaihal MEDIA puts together works of ten nationally acclaimed artists. The intention is to raise funds through this initiative to dominantly draw attention to the AIDS pandemic, to facilitate awareness in the spread of this disease, supporting methods in which assistance is offered to the children living with HIV/AIDS, and helping to inculcate consciousness in future prevention.

First Anniversary Initiative from PAI TRUST

The ten artists who have generously donated their works are Farhan Mujib, P.G. Dinesh, N. Ramachandran, Niloufer Seth Siddharth, P. Suresh Kumar, George K., Bhavna Sonawane, Trotsky Marudu, Mark Rathinaraj and K.R. Santhana Krishnan. Except for Farhan, Dinesh and Bhavna who are based in Delhi, Cochin and Mumbai respectively, the rest belong to the city of Chennai. The works of these artists is marked by a diversity of visual language which makes it visually exciting and offers textural interest. Post Madras Art Movement, artists in Chennai have forged ahead with different medium, materials, techniques, and concepts that has changed the texture of art making in this metro. Within this context of essential changes, the perceptions of the artists have equally come to bear upon their lived realities producing art expressions that can be read as a case of significant conceptualization.

'Line on Grey' series 5

Trotsky Marudu in addition to making line his main  protagonist to communicate his concepts and emotions he also engages with colours employing strokes in dynamic gestural rhythms and movement in creating his abstracts that are invested with energy. Trotsky wears many hats and his artistic expression is not confined to one medium of either painting or drawing. His field includes graphic design, book illustrations, art direction for popular cinema, textile design, animation, and social activism. With experience and expertise in diverse fields it comes as no surprise that the artist directs his lines and colours with absolute command and confidence. What needs to be appreciated about his engagement with these two elements is that he not only exhibits  fluid facility but it is the quality of line either independently or drawn through colours that can be read as emotional, sentimental, sensitive, aggressive, poetic, subliminal, descriptive and narrative.

Neighbourhood series 16

Mark Rathinaraj’s interpolation through lines enables him to render figurative imagery with easy facility. His paintings and sketches do emphasize the ethnicity with colour and facial contours. In absolute control of his medium, Mark has mediated through this versatile element to recreate generic portraits of people with different professions and occupation. The stunning simplicity of his visual approach invests it power. What distinguishes his works is his thick, confident meandering, and lines rendered with absolute assurance. Moving beyond he now concentrates exclusively on faces creating interesting caricatures of ethnic types.

Untitled

K. R. Santhana Krishnan engages with the liminal concept interfacing with doors to explicate his ideas of the past and the future. Interfacing with the metaphor of the threshold, the artist articulates his expressions through the motif of the doors and the reality that lie beyond it. His visual language is premised on realism which enhances his conceptual approach. The colours are equally vibrant as observed in the street culture of smaller towns. 

Melancholy

George K’s versatility emerges from his conceptual approach and makes an impact through his hyper realism. In an encounter with his works one perceives the style, which underpins realism, pop culture and the graffiti scribbled across the painting.  The execution of paintings is carried out from photographs shot by George; by hoarding artists, typified by their broad brush strokes, expansive tonalities, shades and colours. The works are further extended by George who scribbles his poetry across or make similar marks that bear the trace of his personality.

Degree of Certainty

N. Ramachandran’s works are process oriented and he conceptualizes upon the elusive and engages with various mediums as photography, the kitsch elements, newspaper, drawings and found objects, shaping his concepts through it. His extensive use of the body in fragments may appear traditional, but are assemblages dividing it to interface his experiences. These reflections in his art works are made to appear as traditional paintings but are not; rather are made as assemblages divided into mathematically precise squares, with each containing an object. In his latest series, he has moved on to interrogate photographic images playing upon the binaries of self and shadow.

Still life with three vases

Farhan Mujib is a papier colle artist creating collages which thematically reflects his visual culture rendered through delicate forms and shapes. The reality of the artist’s exploration is the visual culture namely the grocery store, a paan shop, a roadside dhaba, a market which offer a harsh, dynamic yet a vibrant collage of cultures, times and materials or the literature in terms of prose and poetry offering him a verbal reality which he transforms imaginatively– all of which defines a new aesthetic. 

Untitled

P. G. Dinesh has a satirical approach with his iconography which is diabolical and has the capacity to shock, interfacing with hybrid imagery to offer wit and humour. His style is dramatically simple and unabashed, his imagery tantalizing, seductive, engaging, powerful, provocative and shocking.  His subject is his invented individualized history and myths excavated from the popular visual culture of his milieu, creating a narrative of the contemporary.

Untitled

Niloufer Seth Siddharth who is an artist trained in painting and visual communication, interfaces with generic female faces, juxtaposing it with a flower, to convey fragility, innocence and covert eroticism. With her feminine approach she creates prettified faces and sensuous elegant female forms indirectly making a narrative of the consumer culture of fashion. The flowers enable her to emote as she has engaged with different decorative varieties, reflecting her feminine world, which is one of beauty, emotions, feelings, wish fulfillment as well as her gentle persona and quite demeanor.

Bloom

Bhavna Sonawane interfaces with her city to create evocative architectural topographies that transmutes to a fairy land with subtle colours and shades. Despite the fact that it a bustling overcrowded metro she engages with its architecture and varied sights and sounds to evoke a serene world lending to it a lyrical charm. She allows a materialization of this world through her lines and an evocative poetic colour which is manipulated with fluid grace obtaining results that impart an appearance of transparency and opaqueness at the same time. This perhaps is her strength which along with her mellifluous line marks it as her signature style. 

Orange AB

P. Suresh Kumar’s abstraction with colour fields gestalts to varied images animate or inanimate. The vibrancy of colours and the rich resonance of its chroma make a dynamic impact on the viewer’s sensibility. The gestural rhythm implicit in his brush strokes and colour juxtaposition implicates a mastery over these elements. His manipulation of colours with what appears as random brush or palette knife strokes invests it emotional qualities. His abstracts radiate with concealed light, which enhances the significance of his abstracts.

Dr. Ashrafi S. Bhagat M.A., M.Phil, Ph. D. is an Art Historian, Art Critic and an Author. She is Associate Professor and Former Head teaching at the Department of Fine Art, Stella Maris College, [Autonomous] Chennai.  She writes exhibition catalogues for artists and on modern and contemporary art in newspapers, magazines and journals.

Love Heals!

“Let the children come to me” said Jesus. The children welcome you ‘enga veetukku vaanga’ (come to our home) as a beautiful Servite Children’s Home stands tall behind them.

‘Love Heals’ is written all over the structure. The foundation stone laid by Mrs.  & Mr. Udhayanidhi Stalin few months ago has now been inaugurated by Thiru. M. K. Stalin, Honourable Deputy Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu on 31st October 2010. The children’s excitement went overboard as he spent more than an hour with them. He stressed that children affected and infected with HIV/AIDS have dreams which need to be realized by instilling confidence in them.

Pioneering effort in taking care of the sick is being continued by Servite Sisters at Holy Family Hansenorium, Fathima Nagar, Trichy. They played a vital role in taking care of the Lepers when they were discriminated in the society, then Tuberculosis and now people living with HIV/AIDS.

As he appreciated the services rendered by the Sisters, he also enumerated the health care initiatives of this Government being emulated by other States in India. The children sang invoking God’s presence and together with Deputy Chief Minister planted tree sapling around the building.

Children need to be loved and they should know that they are loved. This home is a perfect example as it envisages holistic growth of these children. People AIDS Initiative is proud of being part of their welfare and thanks its Principal Patron, Mrs. Kiruthiga Udhayanidhi who is determined to go all out for the children in need.

God bless all the generous contributors and volunteers unnamed behind this effort who strongly feel, ‘love heals’. 

Thanjavur 08.12.2009 Arul Theatre

Arul theatre in Thanjavur cancelled their regular matinee show to accommodate screening of trilogy towards the cause of children. District Collector Mr. M.S. Shanmugam I.A.S put the emotions in a nutshell when he said, “What melted was not only the chocolate in the movie, but our hearts too”. Salesian Provincial Fr. Amalraj, Mrs. Kiruthiga Udhayanidhi, Fr. Raj, Dr. Michael Radhika, Fr. Camillus and Mr. Jebaraj, President, Salesian Co-operators were the other dignitaries on stage.

Students from Bon Secours College presented in dance an awareness song on HIV/AIDS and Mrs. Kiruthiga promised that all infected children in Tamilnadu will be covered under the new insurance scheme.

Trichy 08.12.2009 Kalai Arangam

People AIDS Initiative, a step towards creating a society which is alive to the sentiments of people living with HIV/AIDS particularly children, screened trilogy at Kalaiarangam theatre, Trichy. The event was well arranged by Holy family Hansenorium, and people thronged to support the event at the venue.

Addressing the gathering, district Collector Mr. Soundaiya I.A.S stressed the need to provide them peaceful and honourable living in the society. Mrs. Kiruthiga Udhayanidhi, Mother Provincial Sr. Carona Mary, Salesian Provincial Fr. Amalraj Susai, Mr. Ramajayam, Fr. Raj, Dr. Rani were the other notables on the dais. Students from Holy Cross College presented a colourful skit on AIDS awareness.

Madurai 07.12.2009 Ambika Theatre

The message from Life...Love...Hope... was loud and clear as the gathering took to heart the pain of stigma and discrimination. Don Bosco Youth Services and RUSS Foundation were the event partners who made all the arrangements.

Dr. M. Gnanavaram, Principal, Tamilnadu Theological Seminary, Mrs. Kiruthiga Udhayanidhi, Mr. Rajendran, Project Officer, TANSACS, Fr. Glorious Steve, Mr. Belin Jose, Fr. Raj, and Fr. Francis launched ‘People AIDS Initiative’ and released the trilogy DVD and a book on HIV/AIDS during the event.

Speaking on the occasion and also on Hello FM later, Mrs. Kiruthiga Udhayanidhi said this problem needs more attention as isolation and discrimination of the infected, is attached with the disease.

Salem 06.12.2009 ARRS Complex

A pin-drop silence descended on the audience, a majority of them children and students, as the powerful portrayal of infected children unfolded before their eyes. To shun societal stigma and give them the dignity and care they longed for, ‘People AIDS Initiative’ was launched on 5th Dec 2009.



A DVD on these films was released during the function at ARRS complex in which Mayor J. Rekha Priyadarshini; District Revenue Officer M. Rajarathinam; Deputy Commissioner (Law and Order) Y. John Nicholson; Dean, Government Medical College Hospital P. Shanmugam and Rev. James Theophilus (Salem Don Bosco) participated.


Appearing before the audience, Director Sasikumar spoke about the reason for his involvement in the movie in which leading stars spontaneously acted with no fees. He reiterated that children need to be loved and this message has to be repeated often.

Coimbatore 05.12.2009 Shanthi Theatre

Shanthi Theatre in Coimbatore saw people brimming in for a cause and the message from trilogy was well accepted with emotions. District Collector Dr. P. Umanath I.A.S, City Corporation Commissioner Mr. Anshul Mishra I.A.S, Director Mysskin, I.C.T.C. Counsellor R. Meenakshi, Fr. Raj, Don Bosco Anbu Illam Director Fr. Santhanaraj, and Mr. Raja Mannar were the dignitaries on the dais.



Director Mysskin lit up the spirits of the audience when he revealed, “this was the best movie of my career” and encouraged everyone to bring out the ‘good person’ in them.