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Art

History

Before my 3rd birthday, maybe even earlier, my parents gave me a box of colors. I am not sure if the colors worked as excellent pacifiers, but I got many more boxes of them — time and again. I happily painted on the walls. Somehow my parents convinced me to paint on a more appropriate material (like paper), and thus my interest in creativity took seed (I guess).

Career Choices

I have been passionate about drawing and painting for as long as I can remember. In fact, there was a time when I seriously considered art as my future career. As luck would have it (rather, as circumstances dictated), that was not to be. Most of our relatives, friends and acquaintances "suggested" that it would probably be disastrous to take up art as a career. This was the 1980s. Everybody I knew had this notion that artists end up as paupers, and fame eludes most of them until they die. I was young enough and happy-go-lucky enough to not worry about my future. On popular demand and general recommendation, I was coaxed into doing something conventionally academic (or academically conventional, if that makes more sense). With a degree in Computer Science today, I sometimes am amused by the incidents and ideologies that shaped my career so far — all that happened, and all that didn't.

Forging Money

I have fond memories of many of my creative endeavors, some of which I consider rather bizarre in retrospect. For instance, when I was very young, I once looked very hard at a 5 Rupee currency bill (note, locally speaking). I then found a sheet of paper that felt similar, and cut a piece exactly the same size as the bill. Thereafter, I painstakingly copied every single detail of the original bill, using folio colors. The end result looked very much like the original to the casual eye, so much so that I was able to use it at one local shop to buy candy!

What are you smoking?

Shortly afterwards, I "created" a cigarette. I wanted to play a prank on one of my dad's friends who smoked. I used good quality paper and rolled it into a cylinder the same size as a cigarette, and carefully glued it. I painted the "filter" end with the right looking color, and sealed it with cotton dipped in glue. I then soaked some tea grains (that resembled very much the tobacco in the real cigarettes) in glue and filled the cylinder. The resultant "cigarette" was very realistic, and the bewilderment on my victim's face when he "lit" it (literally!) was worth all the effort.

Aerophilia

I once drew hundreds of aircrafts: passenger jets, fighter jets, bi-planes and various others, trying to match the real ones in color and detail, although I also drew tons of hypothetical ones. I then cropped the unused paper out and ended up with a box full of "planes". Often I would lay all of them on the floor in our living room and look at them. I need to locate that box.

Comical Fantasies

In the summer of 1988, I created a comic book with great enthusiasm. I was a little over 12 years old, I loved comics, and was very impressed with the likes of Asterix. I wanted to come up with something of my own, and the comic became one of my larger organized efforts in art, wherein I worked furiously for two weeks straight, with my parents panicking. The comic, The Adventures of Mr. Lal, has its own page.

This page contains some of my attempts at art. A lot of my art work has been ravaged by the forces of time, laziness, my kid sister, and in some cases, my own fury (once I got mad enough — I believe in retaliation to something my parents had said — to burn a few of my oil paintings. Later on, I regretted doing so deeply).

All images listed on this page are scans of original art hard-copies. Any or all images may be used freely for a non-commercial purpose, with my prior permission.

Comic Book

The Adventures of Mr. Lal has its own page.

Pencil Colors

Pencil colors are great things to create with - they are the least messy of all, and quite affordable (update: I don't think I would say that again, though). When wielded properly, they yield excellent results. I discovered them in my early childhood, and have been hooked ever since.

I believe I have owned more pencil colors than any other type. Due to their non-messiness and portability, I still give pencil colors a try sometimes. The painting on the right was created using pencil colors that double up as water colors.

Wax Crayons and Oil Pastels

I have always liked to draw with crayons and oil pastels. Wax on paper and the accompanying coarseness is so very conducive to creativity ... ah!

Unfortunately I have lost permanently or misplaced most of my attempts to be creative with them. Here are some which still remain.

Oil on Canvas

Oil on canvas has generally been considered a pretty essential art-form traditionally. I am (was) fond of painting in oils (and fainting in coils), but I haven't done so for many years. It takes more effort and time than I currently have (the need for having to clean up afterwards is not to be underestimated either!). Here are some of my oil paintings that I haven't lost, given away or destroyed (once I did burn some of my oil paintings in retaliation to my parents' not "listening" to what I was saying).

Pens

Oh it's so fun to doodle! I like to draw with all kinds of pens: fountain pens, ball points, roller, felt-tip, permanent markers ... Pens that have faded or partly dried out are excellent drawing tools. I used to possess the biggest pen armory amongst all my friends, which was no mean feat. Needless to say, it did not necessarily make my parents feel good about it, because they cost a fortune. I drew the "Security" picture on the right as a presentation slide for my undergraduate major project (the context was computer security).

Water Colors

Water colors for me have usually been an "academic" medium. Let me explain. Most of the schools I have studied at (in other words, "been subjected to") used to have painting classes in which I was required to use water colors. Not that I dislike this medium, but water colors are associated with the routine-ness which was inflicted upon me as a result of the teacher asking me to paint specific things in specific ways. Here are some of my actual school submissions (some of them clearly bear my teacher's signature and grade!).

Random

I do not have any pictures to put here, at the moment. I did experiment with random art material like clay, metal, mud, sand, glass and so on, but all outcomes of such endeavors have either been lost, or are in a geographical region inaccessible to me currently.