Rajarajeswari MuralI have (almost) completed the Kerala Mural styled Rajarajeswari painting which Vasuki Ma'm had given for practise. Depending on my mood I may go for the designs in the dress of the Amman, but it is not mandatory. It was a long drawn and exhausting affair which I took it slowly and steadily. I am enclosing the series of "Work In progress" photos in this post, which I took while working on this painting. After doing this I felt that our madam had done the best by giving Lord Ganesha as our first painting because this really took much more work than what was needed for Ganesha. Even though the basic picture looked so plain I could feel that feel of mural appearing in various stages. And... I didn't bother to add my own or 'correct' the draft given by our Ma'm as I believe her draft completely. Atlast I have learnt to make paintings patiently rather than rushing through to see the final product as soon as possible.

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Hai Guys, Our Vasuki Ma'm is planning a Thangka Painting workshop, which is a Tibetian form of art with profound Chines influences thus forming an intresting convergence of cultures. The workshop is planned at her Eenjambakkam residence for 5 days (in her own words -' continous five days is not compulsory , you can attend it with break here and there if needed ') starting from 16th Dec '09 to 28th Dec '09. The workshop costs Rs. 3500/- inclusive of the materials. Having done a couple of workshops with her I can vouch for her that she sees to it that the participants were taught the background of the art, its finer details like style and strokes along with the techniques so that the participant understands why he/she is made to draw in such way. Our Kerala mural batch enjoyed some intresting conversations with her. Mrs. Vasuki can be reached directly through email at - vasuki.lv (at) gmail.com or by phone - +91-94448-01432. Incase you couldn't reach her, contact me through the contact form so that I will pass the contact details to her. - {oshits} views

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'Oh! I am sad that it is the last day of the training' said Sunita while leaving for the third day of the Kerala Murals Workshop held recently at Dakshina Chitra. Normally this happens on a minimum 3 day workshop where people get know the others better than an 1-2 day workshop, or when the participant numbers is minimum and most importantly when the people in the workshop share the same passion & feel strongly towards the art. We had an eclectic mixture of people from all walks of life - housewife / IT professionals / Students / Chennai settled foreigner and a couple of NRIs who shared the same levels of intrest. In this post rather than writing about technicalities of Kerala Murals, let me write about how I came across these Kerala murals for the first time.

Madhubani PaintingIt was the sheer co-incidence that I saw the advertisement on Indian Express as well as the boredom of staying in Chennai on the weekends that made me attend the Madhubani Painting workshop in Dakshinachitra. To be frank I had no clue about what a Madhubani painting meant, until I googled for the same on the eve of the workshop. I would love to say that it made my weekend useful and better. I got exposed to an art that was sheerly purely the form of expression rather than going by and for rules of painting. I wanted to write about this painting on Sunday night itself but was having some other appointments and a subsequent mental block so that I couldn't read / write / paint anything. Atlast I am here to present this beautiful form of art for those who haven't heard about this. Madhubani paintings traces it origin to the Ramayana days - when King Janaka commissioned artists to do the paintings on the walls of the city to celebrate his daughter Sita's marriage. May be because of that Madhubani paintings have Sita as the main protagonist.

{mosimage}A couple of days back I was talking to the 'minda poochi' Rishad in our office. A very quite guy, with a smiling face, sat for a chat that evening. I asked him how the life in UAE was? He answered negative that here the life is pretty mechanical. According to him, after slogging in the office he just goes to his room and sleeps, so life is gloomy and boring with no happiness. I told Rishad that this is the same comment people even back in India says, so it is an universal phenomenon. So don't blame Dubai alone for your unhappiness. Then I asked him to tell what makes him happy actually. He thought for a while and said that he didn't know what will give him happiness, but he is not happy. I probed into his past like his extra curricular activities during school and college days.