FISHES COME ALIVE ON CANVAS

Fishes have a strange liveliness in them. It is indeed fascinating to watch these tiny colourful creatures with their eyes always wide open, resting only occasionally, moving around in the water with their undulating bodies. While some dart around with an excited frenzy, others glide around serenely, both creating the same palliative effect on the observer. Capturing it on canvas would be quite difficult. But for a young artist like Manjunath, who is presenting Matsyavarna, his solo painting exhibition on fishes, it is just easy as the fish's glide. All his paintings are based on a single theme — fish — portraying fishes of different hues and shapes in vibrant colours and movements in water.

The exhibition is open from Nov.19 to 27 and is being held at Sri Kalanikethana Art Gallery in Vijayanagar 2nd Stage between 10 am and 5 pm.

Hailing from Hassan, Manjunath is doing his second year BVA (Bachelor of Visual Arts) at the Fine Arts College in Mysore. He lost both his parents when he was just seven years old and it was his uncle J.C. Mahadeva Shetty, Principal, Kalanikethana School of Arts, who brought him up. "Since childhood, I was fascinated to watch fishes and even went with my grandfather to catch them in nearby lakes. This fascination prompted me to paint them on canvas in different colours and angles," says Manjunath speaking of his obsession to paint fishes.

He has painted several types of fishes like the Gold Fish, Red Fish and several varieties of sea fish including some representative forms like the Wood fish and Watermelon fish. "Though I have painted over 100 different varieties of fishes in the past four months, I am putting here on display only around 50 of them which I think are good" and adds, "As exhibiting my talent for the first time, I am also a bit nervous."



Talking about his experiments on the theme of his painting, he said, "I have drawn the skeleton of a fish. Giving life for that dead skeleton, I have made it look alive," and adds rather philosophically, "One can appreciate art better if one understands the nuances of art, like grammar which we should know to understand a language. Every painting is different from the other. The expo which is quite unique brings to life the artistic feature of fishes."

Continuing, Manjunath says, "I use all kinds of paints like acrylic, water-based, oil-based. I am also a graphic designer. I have much more to learn in this field and I love to teach this knowledge of mine to others."

Though it would not be possible to explain in detail about every work on display at the gallery, overall it is an interesting collection of assorted fishes with a strange liveliness to them. Manjunath can be contacted on Mob: 94818-21941.