I had a theme in mind when I painted this. I asked Satish what it symbolized or what he thought of it. He came up with certain interesting things and it was only then that I realized that I should stop giving names or titles to my paintings. When you name art, the observer takes your word for it and the depth is lost. Abstract art does not have one explanation or meaning, it is defined by what the artist wants it to be interpreted as. It would be interesting to know what you all see in this piece. 

Autumn

Am I missing fall colours or what! No place as beautiful as Canada in fall, Smoky Mountains is a close second! I have been wanting to paint colourful trees for a while now with acrylics, after my first not-so-successful winter trees painting. This was inspired by one of the works by Patty Baker that I came across and I just had to try it out. Difficult to paint defining leaves with acrylic brushes that I have, hence the patchy work. 

Fresh!

Back to acrylics, with a simple bunch of flowers. I didn't realize how difficult it would be to make fine strokes with the acrylic brushes. I wanted to try something that I would normally paint using water colours. There is less definitiveness and more abstractness but with the right selection of brushes, I think, its possible to fine-tune the strokes.  

Dawn

This one took me back to my high school days when I would paint a lot of landscapes, all with water colours. This painting is actually inspired by a photograph, set in Kerala I believe, clicked by my friend Karthick and I made it as a gift for him. It caught my eye when I was going through his collection since the caption for this one was 'New Beginning' (http://goo.gl/2fBMNY). It seemed apt since it was a gift to wish him all the very best for his new start in Toronto. Its obviously not as perfect as his picture, but I enjoyed painting the water, the trees, the sky after a long time! I name it 'Dawn' since thats what it reminds me of.

Freehands

Its been a while I sketched with a pencil or a pen, its all mostly been use of paints directly on paper/canvas, as rightly pointed out by mom. This post is hence dedicated for freehand sketches! This is probably my third or fourth art related to ships, I guess I am truly fascinated by them. The one on the left is just a pen freehand with a little bit of pencil use. I definitely should work more on my sketch work, always feels good to go back to where you started.

Addiction

My friend HK wanted me to paint with a theme 'addiction'. I thought about it, one aspect of addiction I felt I could represent through colours was its deep-rootedness. I also wanted to show the different phases of addiction through different colours. Addiction implies loss of control and hence the haziness and randomness of colours in the top part of the painting. The theme probably doesn't come across very clearly, so I guess its open for interpretation to the observer :)! I do have another idea in mind for the same theme, should give it a try in my next attempt. 

Kandinsky

Speaking of Kandinsky, abstract art is nonrepresentational. It is truly an art to go wild with your imagination and be able to create a masterpiece, Kandinsky was such a genius artist! I had been looking through his art online and as I take to water colours for this blog post, I have tried to reproduce one of his paintings. Although Kandinsky would turn in his grave if I call this one a reproduction of his art, I think it is more like a lesson for myself. An important step to make abstract art is to loosen the brush strokes, drift away from definitiveness of form. Thats a big challenge for me, something I need to work on. 

Expressionism

Ever since I visited AGO (Art Gallery of Ontario) with Na, I have been fascinated by Kandinsky and his style. Especially since Na pointed out that my paintings look like they are influenced by his philosophy of abstract art, use of bold colours and expressionism. And what a coincidence that the weekly email from my palette knife painting subscription had an interesting lesson on "Expressionist Landscape" painting. I just had to try it out and was really delighted with the outcome! I can't say there is a hidden interpretation or a personal expression hidden in this painting, since I was mostly following an online lesson; but the idea of intentionally losing the definitiveness of existing things and at the same time maintaining their non-abstract nature, with an imbibed expression is just so cool! I definitely want to try one again soon and this time with a meaning to it.

Jimi Hendrix

This is my first attempt at portrait painting, portrait not so much since I've made it colourful! My friend Satish has been asking me to paint Jimi Hendrix for him since the past year now... this is probably not the version he expects but I think to get to a full form Jimi with a guitar et al, I had to start somewhere. I looked up Jimi Hendrix on the web and found many artistic versions. Really good ones! I bookmarked a few I liked and this one is sort of a mixture of those. I am kinda happy with it, feels like a good blend of art and music :)! I am hoping to paint another one, mostly with acrylics. But this one has definitely made me feel a little more confident about painting portraits. 

Life is beautiful!

Haven't been painting lately and wanted to get back to it with something small but free flowing. My friend Na gifted me a traditional Chinese paint brush long time ago and when I found the brush, I was surprised I hadn't used it even once. It is a special brush which can be used for thick strokes as well as thin. I finally used the brush, I have never been very good at painting flowers, so kept it simple. Na saw it and thought even the painting looked like traditional Chinese art, and I took it as a compliment :)!

Ships

Starting with the new year with some vibrant combination of colours! And some experimentation...

I was looking for some inspiration on the web for palette knife paintings since I never got to it again after my first attempt. I started off this one with acrylics and for the sky patchwork moved on to the palette knife. The smudgy effect hasn't quite come out the way I wanted it to, but I was glad that my experiment didn't turn out a disaster! 

Heres wishing everyone a colourful and adventurous new year :).