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Hands that speak art, differently
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Heard of public art? If abstract strokes and fluid designery can make concrete sense to you, you will love the medium for your office or home, says RANJANI GOVIND
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— Photo: V. Sreenivasa Murthy
All with bare hands: A piece of public art
Give Kalyan Rathore some strips of steel and you will see a design emerging as he thoughtfully places the coils in his contemporary advances of ‘public art.’ 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 times a mural too with fibre reinforced plastic) after he v
isualises 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.
Acrylic on canvas
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.
Concept
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.”
All with bare hands: A piece of public art
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 on the outskirts of Bangalore which stands eight foot tall. “My work for Dakshin Foundry 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 western cities for some reason. But we are no strangers to monuments, minarets and sculpture, says Kalyan. “These can often represent a 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 the regular thought process.”
All done by Kalyan Rathore.
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 set 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.justerday.com)
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