Monsoons

Hi. I am a much relieved man now as my blog problem got sorted out. There was a script running on my blog which was automatically redirecting me to another site. Now that script has been removed and my blog is safe. :)

I have been thinking of doing a night rainy scene for sometime now. Monsoons have almost arrived and we are receiving pre-monsoon showers here every now and then. I have been observing the roads at night for quiet sometime now and finally thought of painting them. I just took my previous plein air painting of Bhoganadiswara temple and applied my observations for a night rainy scene to it. I had made a small sketch which looked good, but when it was done on a large scale like this one, it was just not having the same effect. I took some advice from my artist friend Ramkrishna and incorporated it in the painting. While doing that I got more ideas and added it. And that actually brought some life into the painting.

I have still not thought of a title for this. Can you suggest one??

By the way I'll be taking a one day workshop on Basics of watercolor on 20th and 21st of this month at Frazer town and Koramangala respectively. The details are here. The number of participants is limited to 10-12, so that the students can be given individual attention. So if you want to book a seat you must do it right away.

With that I'll sign off. Hope you all are having a great week.

Untitled

20 x 26 inch

From Nandi hills

The trip to Nandi hills with pencil jammers last Sunday was some experience. The bus that we had hired seemed like the slowest bus around and took forever to reach the hill top. Sometime it felt like the bus would start rolling backwards on those hilly roads. But anyway we reached our destination around 10:30 AM after a hearty breakfast on the way. There was a big surprise waiting for us there.

Strong winds were blowing across the hill. It was cloudy and was drizzling intermittently. Fortunately we found a covered place overlooking the hill side where we painted. But we had to keep running for our boards and palettes  as they flew off many times while painting. It was some experience I tell you. The scene that I painted was very difficult and I was not able to resolve it well enough. So got into some unnecessary details. But I guess I could get the cloudy and windy feeling in the painting.

After lunch we came down and visited a beautiful temple which is around 1300 years old. It was the Bhoga Nandiswara temple and the residing deity was Shiva and Parvati as you would have guessed. Unfortunately we were not allowed to paint there as it was a protected site under archaeological dept of India. But some of us were negotiating with the authorities to allow us to sketch there. While they were doing that I quickly managed to sketch the scene. Later on when I came back I finished it at home. Though I could not continue painting there it was a great experience visiting the temple. It was so beautiful and peaceful. If you go to Nandi hills anytime make sure to take out sometime to visit this place.

All in all it was a great day of painting and learning.

En plein air @ Nandi Hills, 16 June 2013

11 x 15 inch

En plein air @ Bhoga Nandiswara temple, 16 June 2013

11 x 15 inch