Summer Break

                                        

Growing up, summer break was a period of guilt-free recreational reading that was totally unconnected to studies. Summer break was when your parents could not yell at you for wasting time  reading comics or Mills and Boon or Agatha Christie. By the time my daughter was born it was accepted that any reading was good for the young minds. My daughter was a voracious reader. She would read the labels on the cereal box as avidly as a novel by Edith Wharton. For her too, summer break meant that she can read without breaking for homework. 

The pyrographic art on the cover of this wooden book box evokes those happy memories of long forgotten days. Using my signature motifs, most of the art was wood burned. Only the elephant and the bird were painted. The style of this painting is Indian folk art. 

Linked to Paint Party Friday. 

                                               

Thanks for visiting. Your comments are most welcome.

Yoga Art Journal

I had a lot of fun creating this cover for the journal. I started with raw canvas upon which I wrote by hand Sanskrit verses from Yogasutra, the classic text on yoga by Patanjali. I love adding sizable chunks of texts in my art and I think I have been unconsciously emulating the art traditions of  great medieval Indian empires and kingdoms, where sacred and secular texts and poems were made part of the art itself (see below). Then I painted a stylized image of Ganesha, the Hindu god of auspicious beginnings. Finally, I splattered the cover with paint to create additional texture. I like the way it has turned out.

This very functional art is my submission for Paint Party Friday.

Thanks for visiting ad your comments are always appreciated.

Mother's Day!

Mother's Day is one of my most favorite celebratory days. To honor all mothers of this world, human and non-humans, I did this art with my favorite elephants. Happy Mother's Day!

This is also a response to this week's challenge at I am the Diva. If you look carefully, you will find BRELA scattered in various places.

Enjoy and have a great Mother's Day! Here's another one the same theme.

Thanks for visiting.

Artwork on New Surface

Wood is my new substrate of choice for painting. It began when I spotted small, inexpensive 4"x6" wood panels at Michaels. I bought a whole bunch of them to paint. It was pine or balsa wood and not the best surface to paint. But it was a good experimental surface to try out inks, paints, pencils, markers, pens etc. to see how they preformed on wood. From pine, I switched to birch wood and simply loving the effect! In the last two weeks, I have completed several paintings and put them up for sale on my Etsy shop. Take a look

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Illustrated Recipe with Yoga Art

I created this illustration of my original recipe for They Draw and Cook a few months ago.(You will find the full step-by-step instructions with photos here  I finally got around to creating a print version for sale in my Etsy shop. This is the first time I have done an illustrated recipe and combining my signature yoga art with vegetarian cooking and it is an exciting new path. I hope to do more.

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(Republished as a new post as part of Seth Apter's 2013 Treasure Time)

How Does One Get to Carnegie Hall

How does one get to Carnegie Hall? According to urban legend the answer is "practice, practice, practice". Of course, talent and ambition help too. Elephant Lochanadevi practicing her standing balance is my submission to this week's Illustration Friday theme "Talent".

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Art by Indira Govindan. If you are curious about this and art in the yoga art series, please visit my Etsy shop

Happy Pongal!

Tomorrow (January 13) is the first day of Pongal, a three-day festival celebrated in Tamilnadu. Pongal, which  means "flow over", is a harvest festival, but celebrated by all Tamilians. The most popular icon of Pongal festival is a cooking pot with sugarcane shoots tied on the sides and brimming over with steaming milk and rice. The overflowing pot is a symbol of auspicious beginnings and is heralded with the banging of metallic plates and spoons (kind of drum roll). I remember doing it when I was little and it was fun. Growing up, Pongal was always fun mainly because of all the wonderful food my mother used to make for three days and no school either. Just eating and playing!

In the countryside it is a big event--the farmers paint and decorate their house, throw away old and unwanted things, buy new clothes, prepare feasts and have country fairs where they bring livestock all spruced up and painted. And everywhere, people celebrate it by making varieties of rice dishes--sweet rice, lemon rice, coconut rice, tamarind rice, yogurt rice--all accompanied by a medley of vegetables. 

Pongal celebrates the transit of Sun into the sign of Capricorn (Thai) and the beginning ofuttaranayana punyakala or the northern ascension of the Sun (its 6-month transit over the northern hemisphere). That is why, the month of Thai  is also celebrated as the season of hope and new beginnings. 

HAPPY PONGAL EVERYONE!

Thanks for visiting. Submitted to Illustration Friday's this week's theme "MYTH".

Artwork by Indira

New Year Resolution

One might ask whether young children can understand the concept of new year resolution. I think they can--they certainly grasp the idea of positive and negative actions, like "not fighting"or  "being friends", and they do have a sense of time like "now" or "later". As I look back at my daughter's childhood, by the time she was 4 or 5, she was quite capable of coming up with a new year resolution for herself, even something like the one above!

Submitted for Illustration Friday this week's challenge "NEW".

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Glowing with the Spirit

The theme for this week at the Illustration Friday is GLOW. This art above is my submission.

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Weekly Challenge #97: String Theory vs. No Strings Attached





This week's challenge at I am the Diva is an intriguing concept of doing an entire zentangle tile without using string. I thought I would give it a twirl with one of my yoga art drawing. Usually, my yoga art work is quite orderly in the placement of motifs and patterns. The Diva's challenge provided an opportunity to let the inner doodler take over. It was a fun project and the result (pictured above) pleased me. More than that, it pleased my daughter so much that she bought it!

 The picture below is the original version.

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Illustration Friday: Tree

This is my submission for Illustration Friday's topic for this week, which is TREE. Trees are very much part of my yoga art series, especially in the meditation poses. If you want to see 1000+ interpretation of tree in art, jump over to IF site  and you will not be disappointed.

Thanks for visiting.

Illustration Friday: Mirror

My submission for this week's topic at Illustration Friday.

For more of my art check out my Etsy shop.

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Number 10 in the Series: Yoga Art

Yesterday, I completed the tenth and the eleventh painting in my elephant yoga art series, which felt like a bit of a milestone. Two years ago, when I did my first piece (below) I did not think I had the imagination to continue with it for this long. In the overall scheme of things, ten is  not a huge number especially given that Patanjali's yoga sutras have hundreds of yoga postures of which at least fifty are currently practiced and, I should have been able to churn out one art piece every week. It was slow going for me mainly because I wanted to depict the poses as accurately as possible while finding a proper way to align the trunk (!), simultaneously maintaining the beauty and the dignity of the character (elephant) doing the poses. Then there was always the question of how to make the baby elephant part of the story. The idea for the asana usually tends to come after the daily yoga practice and I will it work in my head during my long daily commute and then start sketching it on paper.  I am not a a quick draw artist. So, at this stage, eraser becomes absolutely indispensable as you can see below.

Over the course of two years,  the  paintings  evolved organically and began to find its audience. Because I had decided that I would not sell copies, each and every buyer gets an original painting done fresh and new for her. Yes, my buyers are usually women and many of them are from the West Coast.

You can read more about the evolution of my yoga art here. Below are images from my complete yoga series and, you will find them all in my Etsy shop.

Most Popular!

First and Favorite!

Young Mothers' Favorite

Another Young Moms' Favorite

My Sister's Favorite

Yoga Art Anantasana Reclining Posture

The word "ananta" in Sanskrit means Eternal. It also refers to the serpent bed of Vishnu, the Hindu god, lying on the ocean of eternity. In yoga, it is an asana for improving the mobility of the spine and hips and opening the groin. In this asana, the body reclines on the side, one leg extending up toward infinity. It is a relaxing pose but intense too. While the head is resting comfortably in the palm of the hand, the challenge is in stretching the other leg straight updwards while keeping the body in alignment.

I think, Lochanadevi is well-versed in doing this pose although, being an elephant she does need the help of a flower belt to keep her leg upright. Even in this pose, she looks like an Indian Queen, all bedecked in colorful jewelry!. This pose also is inviting to the Baby to curl up snugly against Mom. What do you think she is doing with the flower cord around her trunk--being mischievous or helping her mama?

The inspirations for my yoga art come from my long practice of yoga and, from raising a family with all the ups and downs that go with it. We know as parents, the joy of when our children want to be exactly like us, the puzzlement of when they absolutely do not want to be like us and the satisfaction of when they learn to find a balance.

I depict mother elephant and her calf instead of humans in my yoga art humans because elephants are matriarchal and very family oriented animals. Elephants are also the most beloved of Indian animals and they are also very agile and flexible and it was entirely possible to imagine the mother elephant doing all those yoga poses while the little one watched. Hathi means elephant in Hindi and hence the play on Hatha yoga as hatha (i) yoga.

The painting is done in Indian folk art style--the images are unidimensional but have great details. In the typical folk art style, the watercolor paper was first dyed into variegated brown shades using several natural dyes. The painting itself is done mostly with primary colors. There is also a border around the central image, also typical of this style of painting. I call the mother elephant Lochana because she has such big beautiful eyes.

The elephants are heavily decorated which is a commonly found in Indian paintings and in real life also.

Available in my Etsy shop and for more work on my yoga art series please visit my shop http://www.etsy.com/shop/DharmaKarmaArts?section_id=6511983

**Proceeds from the sale are donated to support physically handicapped children and adults. For more information, go to www.sukriti.org

Yoga Art: Warrior III

The inspirations for my yoga art come from my long practice of yoga and, from raising a family with all the ups and downs that go with it.

I named the mother elephant Lochanadevi because she has such beautiful eyes. Lochanadevi, like all modern mothers, is super busy juggling multiple roles on a daily basis. And, setting aside some personal time for yoga and meditation practice is a big challenge. Luckily for her, her young ones like to hang out with her.  The Warrior pose III or Veerabhdrasana gives both strength and balance that the mother elephant is metaphorically striving for.

I depict mother elephant and her calf instead of humans in my yoga art because elephants are matriarchal family oriented animals and, are also the most beloved of Indian animals. They are very agile and flexible. It is easy to imagine the mother elephant doing all those yoga poses while the little ones watched. I also call this yoga art Hatha(i) art. Hathi means elephant in Hindi and hence the play on Hatha yoga as Hatha(i) yoga.

The painting is done in Indian folk art style--the images are unidimensional but have great details. In the typical folk art style, the watercolor paper is first dyed using tea and coffee. The painting itself is done mostly in primary colors. In India, elephants in real life are decorated with silk, gold and silver ornaments during religious festivals, and in art too they are so depicted.

I prefer to do it this way because yoga inspires my art and my art is a source of vitality and 

All my yoga paintings are original, drawn and painted one at a time for the collector. 

energy for my yoga practice. 

Yoga Art

    *

The inspirations for my yoga art come from my long practice of yoga and, from raising a family with all the ups and downs that go with it. We know as parents, the joy of when our children want to be exactly like us, the puzzlement of when they absolutely do not want to be like us and the satisfaction of when they learn to find a balance.

Lochanadevi, as the mother elephant is called, like all modern mothers, is super busy juggling multiple roles on a daily basis. And, setting aside some personal time for yoga and meditation practice is a big challenge. Luckily for her, her young ones like to hang out with her. The tree pose or vrikshasana in this yoga art gives a beautiful upward stretch and a wonderful sense of balance that the mother elephant is symbolically reaching for.

I depict mother elephant and her calf instead of humans in my yoga art humans because elephants are matriarchal and very family oriented animals. Elephants are also the most beloved of Indian animals and they are also very agile and flexible and it was entirely possible to imagine the mother elephant doing all those yoga poses while the little one watched. Hathi means elephant in Hindi and hence the play on Hatha yoga as hatha (i) yoga.

The painting is done in Indian folk art style--the images are unidimensional but have great details. In the typical folk art style, the watercolor paper was first dyed into variegated brown shades using several natural dyes. The painting itself is done mostly with primary colors. There is also a border around the central image, also typical of this style of painting.

The elephants are heavily decorated which is a commonly found in Indian paintings and in real life also.

You can find this and other yoga art in my Etsy and Artfire shops