Artist takes an abstract view at life as he tries to stay relevant

Coming to an end: In a sense, Nuntius 12.12.12 marks the end of a creative journey Indra began in 2009.

IN A sense, the Nuntius 12.12.12 series marks the end of a creative journey that artist Indra Ramanathan began four years ago in order to stay relevant to the creative process that is very much part and parcel of his life as an architect and designer.

Having hit the big 4-0 in 2009, he declared that he was going to create 42 pieces of art outside the realm of his day job to keep his creative juices flowing.

His journey will end on Dec 12, when he will celebrate the culmination of that process by unveiling his fourth solo exhibition at Taksu Gallery.

The final collection of 12 six-by-six abstract pieces named after the 12 disciples of Jesus, carries its own underlying messages to him personally as according to him, they each represented people who led normal lives thousands of years ago, yet had died horrible deaths.

“People can look at it, gauge and have their own perception of the pieces and take away what they each perceive it to be,” he said, adding that it was a personal thing.

“And if you look closer, there is an underlying meaning in each piece. Take the one on Judas, for example, if you look closely you will see the motive of the coins on the painting which represents the pieces of silver that were given to him to betray Jesus,” he said.

Indra, however, stressed that the emotive connection is different to different people as there are layers of meaning to be perceived in the paintings.

“It is all about everyone’s individual journey,” he said.

His style in Nuntius is abstract minimalistic and there are multiple layers and textures which represent different emotions that he has experienced while working on the pieces.

“None of it looks anything like what it did when I first worked on them. Each piece has gone through at least five reversals,” he said.

He added that the collection was a major effort as it involved ripping the canvas and stitching them together again to create the layered and textured effects and re-painting it over and over on a platform, which was no easy feat.

Indra began his journey with the 09.09.09 installation which featured the nine cities that had a great impact on his life.

For his second solo exhibition entitled Decalogue, he created 10 paintings with a word each on the canvas. Some of the words were — Respect, Renewal, Family, Justice, Faith, Truth and Generosity. 10.10.10 highlighted words of wisdom from the 10 Commandments, words which became Indra’s guiding principles in life.

The third exhibition, 11.11.11, explored his patriotic side. Themed Unum, it featured 11 pieces of mixed-medium artworks, which use the Malaysian flag’s four colours — blue, white, red and yellow.

So what is next?

“Who knows, all I know is that in order to be relevant, I need to be challenged to keep on producing creative works and I guess that I will continue to paint just not in a public way any more,” he said.

Nuntius will be on display from Dec 12 to 19 at Taksu Gallery, No 17, Jalan Pinang, KL. Tel: [phone].