Life on canvas

Kiran Varikilla’s solo exhibition titled ‘Form and Content’ is on display at Gallery Space, Banjara Hills. His works on acrylic on canvas exemplifies a strong personal life experience, which speaks for itself.

Kiran Varikilla, born in Chinnabonkur village, Karimnagar, started painting when he was just five years old. He states that he was inspired more into the craft by the appreciation and direction given to him by his school art teachers. “My belief and interest towards art made me an artist today, which was very new for my family.

I moved out of my village and came to Hyderabad to pursue my Bachelor of Fine Arts from Sri Venkateshwara College of Fine Arts in 2006. And I struggled a lot to become an artist,” Kiran shares.

Kiran informs that he tries to express the daily life experiences on the canvas. “What goes in my mind I try to put it in my paintings. You can say thoughts unto my medium of expression.”

One can see male and female, and a physical relationship between them if one observes closer. Apart from the exploration of the structural grace in human bodies, one can see the flame in every work, which shows the importance of enlightenment of life.

The vertical phallic symbol or the “Linga” may be a predictable representation of spirituality or sexuality but it is also conceived as a dominant force, of sorts, for the artist.

The painting, which is close to Kiran’s heart is the one which depicts three characters – mother, father, and a baby in mother’s womb. “This painting is close to me because I started this when my wife was pregnant with our second baby.

And everybody asked us to go for an abortion because it might be a baby girl but we didn’t and I have two daughters. Today, I am away from my parents for my career and my sisters are taking care of them and I feel that girls are better than boys in every way.”

“The geometrical divisions of the picture surface grants the works a visual balance and structural strength. The inclusion of several square planes and rectangles contribute in assimilating inside a single work, a few smaller compositions.

Each small section is completely balanced and intricately rendered as a perfect form of expression which was going in my mind at that time. And what how society was encouraging me to do about her,” he adds.

His works are like conversations with the self, a soliloquy, which is real and very personal and while may be the reason, he is going to display his same work at Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai, from August 8-14. He is displaying 35 works at Hyderabad and will add 10 more to display in Mumbai.

What: Form and Content
Where: Gallery Space
When: Till July 31, between 11am and 7pm

By Askari Jaffer