Govt institutions get a makeover

Hyderabad: Street artists, Swathi and Vijay have taken up the task of painting the walls of the government hospital and schools in the city and give them a good makeover. Anyone visiting the buildings will be pleasantly shocked with the creativity in the art projects.

The couple has been working together for the past 10 years. Swathi and Vijay together beautified about 25 to 30 government institutions, places like Necklace road, MS Maktha, King Koti and recently, the government hospital at Kondapur.

The duo has graduated with masters in fine arts from the Jawaharlal Nehru Architecture & Fine Arts University College in Hyderabad (JNTUH). Halfway through their postgraduate degree, they got a fellowship that led them to Paris. The trip lasted for nine months that taught them about street art and landed upon the idea of painting for a social cause.

One day while tuning into the local news, they came across this news that a government school in Warangal has lacked in strength. The couple decided to renovate the premises to appeal to the students in order to increase their turnout in school. They spent around Rs 15,000 from their own pockets and gave the school a makeover.

Reiterating on her passion Swathi said, “The idea of painting the walls of primary schools in Hyderabad came from the concept of Graffiti art. We could make some inspiring paintings on the walls of rural government primary schools where the children were not interested to study and parents are not interested to send their kids to Government schools.” They believed that education should be an interesting process of learning and the growth process of a child should be interesting.

The couple made it possible with them painting it in the presence of the kids and making their surroundings interesting. This really helped to increase the literacy rate in that particular village. Vijay said, “Knowing about our work at the government school, director of the hospital called us and asked us to paint the walls. 

She provided the sufficient material to give a new look that draws people’s attention. I wanted to give a vibrant look to the hospitals as well. He added that although people initially think they are crazy when they are painting the buildings, they later shower them with compliments on their amazing job.