An Artistic Evolution Born in an interior part of Tamilnadu and brought up in the capital city of India,Hema had a keen interest in drawing, painting and the fine arts right from childhood. The pictures and photos in the school textbooks always attracted her quiet a lot.However,due to parental opposition to the taking up of fine arts as a career, she had to continue with her formal education and went on to do her post graduation in Economics. Once that was over, she went back to her first love i.e. painting. Her artistic dernaneur and the urge to create was so strong that she could not be constrained to accept an ordinary life.During this period, she met an Italian artist, Marie Luise, who gave her the initial training in still life paintings and also groomed her personality.
This was followed by joining the Madras Art Club where she came into contact with the senior most artists of Madras who, realizing the inherent talent in her encouraged her to to join the College of Arts and Crafts,Madras.The following year saw her join in the college for a regular course in painting.
Subsequently, she moved to Delhi & joined the Qarhi Artists Studios in the Graphics department where she continues to work till today. The studios provided a lively atmosphere where she met fellow artists of her age and other well known artists. She has worked and experimented in the various techniques of printmaking and also improved her painting skill alongside. Today she works in various media appropriate to the imagery.
Despite facing several hardships which comes in the way of many a creative artist, she has steered clear of them to cut a path for herself Hema has never been afraid of the innumerable hassles which came her way from all quarters.Her pride till today is the many invitations she received to participate in several international exhibitions such as Asian Print Art festival at Pusan city, S.Korea- 1996;Dry Point Biennale at Yugoslavia 1997; Small Engravings Saloon Romania-2000 and the Sharjah Biennale of art,Sharjah,U.A.E-2001
She has also held four one person and several group exhibitions in various parts of IndiaA few words about her works
If her earlier works were marked by the presence of many a figures forming part of the composition, Hema's present series of works has evolved over the years to finally emerge with only a few figures magnified to fill the space.
As has been her wont, she chooses to go deeply into a subject, understanding its inner core to produce a work of art that would touch the sublime level. Thus Hema worked on the theme of child lab our for several years when she felt for the little ones whose hands were bitten with hard work when they should be playing around.
In her oil paintings, the theme of communication among various people in the form of a dialogue has been explored. Also the changes the society is facing due to invasion of fashion and its associated evils underline some of her works.
In her etchings, the plate is bitten deep and the dark and light tones of aqua with soft gradation mark the highlight of her works. Here too she experimented with various techniques of printmaking, sometimes combining one or two media's. While continuing to work in pnntmaking, Hema also did a lots of works in different media finally to arrive at the time tested medium of oil paintings. Bright colours and bold figures while not trying to be very realistic at the same time convey the message in simplistic terms.
Hema would like to continue in the same vein to create works that would raise above the conscious level to reach the subconscious taking cue from her own experience.
For the past few years she has also been executing several installations & concept based works which deal with the themes of universe, people & their life in society.
For these works, she uses very simple vocabulary, which is easily understood & conveys a lot of thoughts when explored in detail.
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