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Design shaping up: One can create art out of even junk yard stuff.

Want to try giving him some waste material like discarded mineral water bottles, broken glass, wooden pieces, or even unused furniture and bits of cloth…well, any junk yard stuff and lo! there emerges ‘installation art’ (and many tim es a mural too with fibre reinforced plastic) after he visualises a pattern and brings them together to form a train of thought to explain his envisage.

That’s not all, offer him some acrylic colours and the palette of designery is mind-boggling as he splashes it across on the canvas!

That’s Kalyan’s ‘array of art’ with diversity and assortment being his aesthetic hymns even as his deft hands coordinate his abstract thought processes.

Kalyan’s background has a lot to do with designing, and industrial designing was his forte wherein ergonomics played a key role in contemporary furniture design as much as in his dealing with hospital equipment. He is even now one of the registered designers of National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad. Several IT companies in the city sport his imaginative vision in furniture. “Designing is my passion, and whatever I look at, I feel like moulding it and fashioning it to form some thought,” says Kalyan.

What is the concept behind this sculpture/ public art? “Outdoor sculpture or public art are tall pieces of art wherein stainless steel sheets and coils of steel wire are stranded in various pleasing patterns to bring about a contemplation of energy, thoughts and dreams in the purest forms of existence. It defies matter/material, but these elements have to metamorphose into something more palpable to get into our everyday life.

The tentacles at the top of the steel sculpted feature stand for all things fluid and pure. Then it flows over into the vertical shaft, taking precise geometric shapes.

Kalyan uses plasma cutting and welding for getting his shapes in steel and is then ground to a mirror finish, bringing in lines with raw grinding for a classic chic deliberation.

This is usually an outdoor art and Kalyan’s creation is commissioned at a corporate office in the outskirts of Bangalore which stands at 8 feet high.

“My work for Dakhshin Foundary at Hoskote (dealing with cast iron objects) represents the molten state of the raw material there, and the thoughts are both direct and metaphorical. As one walks past the feature, different regions light up alternately due to the sun rays catching the abrasion marks made on the surface, for a dynamic feel. Such works can be installed at corporates and campuses,” explains Kalyan.

Public art or abstract sculpture is common in the western cities for some reason. But we are no strangers to monuments, minarets and sculpture, says Kalyan. “These can often represent an range of ideas and philosophies and are open to different interpretations by everybody, everyday. To see ‘things of function’ all the time can be claustrophobic, so the function in public art lies in a dimension that calls for realignment of regular thought process.”

Kalyan Rathore conducts ‘Mechanism of creativity’ workshops that attract every professional category…educationists, doctors, photographers and fashion designers. But why only abstract public art, why not figurative sculpture? “The abstracts I do are realistic, they have a theme and thought, just as my paintings,” he adds.

Kalyan conducts many exhibitions and his show at Delhi is said to take off on April 18, at ’Dhoomimal Gallery’ in aid of the society for child development.(Kalyan can be contacted at 98802 72457 or visit www.jusderday.com)

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