How does a senior bureaucrat keep his cool after a stressful day at work? He paints. M. Lokeswara Rao working with the Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education is occupied with his department's works in the mornings. In the evenings, he transforms into an artist, who expresses his feelings through the strokes of a paint brush on the canvas. As his first exhibition of paintings in Hyderabad titled ‘Rainbow' begins at State Gallery of Fine Arts from today, Lokeswara Rao can hardly contain his excitement.
“I was a science graduate and was very good with my drawings,” he says. With his family living in Bengaluru, he was free in the evenings and decided to pursue a hobby and learnt Tanjore painting from Siva Kumari. “I was attracted towards Tanjore paintings as they are a riot of colours and it is a difficult style to learn,” he says. He honed his skills and fine tuned the techniques by browsing different websites.
When he decided to work on a Tanjore painting, the common assumption was that he would create paintings of Gods and Goddesses. He did create dazzling paintings of Lord Ganesha and Lord Venkateswara in Tanjore style but he surprised many with his ‘Alladin with Jasmin' in Tanjore. “I have always believed in thinking out of the box. Creativity is one's property and one has to mould it accordingly,” he says and adds, “When I decided to paint, every one thought I would paint landscapes as I am with the Indian Forest Service (IFS). I wanted to explore many themes,” he says.
Around 74 works which will be displayed at the sale-cum exhibition will also include his works on contemporary themes. The works on Buddha, women and zodiac series are some of his works to be mounted at the gallery. An exhibit ‘Zodiac Taurus', a picture of a bull looking resplendent in bright green, red and yellow colours is a tribute to all the spirited Taureans.
The exhibition to be inaugurated on August 26 at 5 p.m., will go on till August 30.
