Lockdown-day 41

“Destruction after all is a form of creation” – Graham Greene

Gemini Twins

Happy Painting…. Happy Blogging !!!

Stay Home and Stay Safe !!!

Lockdown-day 38

“Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere” – Carl Sagan

Planning to do zodiac signs. Its the Virgo girl today.

Happy Painting…. Happy Blogging !!!

Stay Home and Stay Safe !!!

Lockdown-day 34

“To be prepared is the half the victory” – Miguel De Cervantes

Happy Painting…. Happy Blogging !!!

Stay Home and Stay Safe !!!

Lockdown-day 33

“Love what you do; do what you love” – Wayne W Dyer

I missed painting. Learning and going digital is good but I love drawing and using my brushes 🙂

Happy Painting…. Happy Blogging !!!

Stay Home and Stay Safe !!!

Lockdown-day 22

“Things end but memories last forever” – Kumar Milan

It’s the Lychee season but I might miss it this time as it is not an essential commodity. Guess I will be eating a lot of mangoes this summer to compensate for this.

Happy Painting…. Happy Blogging !!!

Stay Home and Stay Safe !!!

Lockdown-day 19

“Music is a safe kind of high” – Jimi Hendrix

Happy Painting…. Happy Blogging !!!

Stay Home and Stay Safe !!!

Lockdown-day 14

“All good things are wild and free” – Henry David Thoreau

Looks like I will be doing some painting a lot longer than I intended to. My company is asking me to take leave and go on a loss of pay till things get better… whenever that will be !!!

Happy Painting… Happy Blogging!!!

Stay Safe … Stay Home !!!

Lockdown-day 12

“In a world where everyone wears a mask, it’s a privilege to see a soul.”
― Amanda Richardson

Happy painting… Happy blogging !!!

Stay Safe… Stay Home !!!

Lockdown-day 10

“As long as there was coffee in the world, how bad could things be?” – Cassandra Clare

Happy painting… Happy blogging !!!

Stay Safe… Stay Home and Remember it’s weekend … so Happy Weekend !!!

Lockdown-day 9

“If you really want to examine your strength, see how many times a day you are disturbed” – Rama Swami

Happy Rama Navami to everyone celebrating it !!!

Happy Painting… Happy Blogging!!!

Stay Safe… Stay Home !!!

Lockdown-day 8

“That which does not kills us makes us stronger” – Friedrich Nietzsche

Boxed up at home, looks like I am running out of ideas and inspiration. I need to use more colors other than blue and black to keep my spirits up. Wishing everyone a healthy and positive day!!!

Happy Painting… Happy Blogging!!!

Stay Safe… Stay Home!!!

Lockdown-day 7

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication” – Leonardo Da Vinci

Happy Painting … Happy Blogging!!!

StaySafe…StayHome!!!

Lockdown-day 6

“There is no greater pain than to recall happiness in times of misery” – Dante

My heart goes out for all the families and victims in Italy and everywhere around the world. I have always wanted to taste Italian pizza and wine. Still in my bucket list…

Wishing everyone around the world peace, strength and comfort.

Happy Painting … Happy Blogging!!!

StaySafe…StayHome!!!

Rahu-Ketu

“One day or day one. You Decide” – Unknown

So I have been poking my nose into the stars lately – I mean Astrology. Not looking for predictions or ways to become rich or finding faults in my stars either. My study mainly revolves around understanding myself and understanding the situations around me. Having said that, I came across these two shadow planets called Rahu and Ketu and the importance of their placement in the birth chart in the horoscope. This is an interesting line of study that I came across among other things which also become the motivation for my painting.

I checked the placement of Rahu and Ketu in my birth chart. My Rahu sits in Cancer and my Ketu sits in Capricorn. Cancer is represented by a Crab and Capricorn is represented by a Crocodile. So now I got into thinking what does it mean to me? As per the study the sign where Ketu is – is the quality you have in abundant or that is what you are naturally and the sign where Rahu is that is the quality you should strive for in this life. Hmmm…..

What is a Capricorn? A Crocodile – so am I crocodile!!! …. seriously. Now I want to know more about crocodiles.

• They have a survival quality greater than anyone on earth
• They know they can get whatever they want
• Can be ruthless in destroying anything to get their needs met.
• They can be vicious in destroying other things as well as self(ego) if that stands in the way of their overall happiness
• Because they know they can take the things they want and when they want, they don’t feel the need to progress
• They can just relax all the time until they feel hungry or threatened

So this is what a crocodile quality is and if your Ketu is in Capricorn these qualities come naturally to you. But you are in this life to learn something…. Or you can keep holding on to what you are and then take another birth to learn it …..maybe the hard way next time !!! So to know what I should learn I look at where my Rahu is – it is in Cancer. And it is – A Crab. Let’s see what that is…

• tenacious – hold on to something till it works out
• fragile hence very vigilant
• adaptive but searching for more comfortable and less threatening situations
• always gathering something for survival or safety
• very aware of their needs

So how does it all imply to me now. In a nutshell – I can keep the strength of the crocodile but shred the laziness of the crocodile. Rather than waiting for the right moment and acting only when necessary I have to start being the adaptive and busy crab that is constantly doing things to add value to my life. Yawwwnnnn………

So….. the Crab in me has gathered enough information for this post and now the Crocodile in me just wants to laze on that rock …. 🙂 Moreover its a Sunday…. move away crab!!!

Happy Blogging & Happy Sunday!!!

Cheating

“Cheating isn’t a mistake, it’s a choice”  – Unknown

I had once read a quote “You can never make the same mistake twice because the second time you make it, it’s not a mistake, it’s a choice”. So why am I talking about it here. Hmmm … I started this painting some 4-5 months back when I was looking for a job. Then I got one and got busy … very busy. Finally when I got time to complete it I had lost interest but true to my nature I can’t abandon it and move to the next one so I finish doing the entire outline using a pen instead of paint. I had done the same with my other painting – Self-torture , instead of painting I used the pen to finish the detail. On one side I am glad I am through with this one and can move onto the other but I am not proud of myself. the artist in me screamed “cheater” the whole time but in my defense I had lost patience, interest and wanted to just finish this one and move on.

This got me into thinking – are we trying to pass on our bad choices as mistakes? My bad choice got the job done faster and easier but if I get used to it, it will prove fatal in the long run. It will always leave me feeling bad at the end and I will regret the road I have taken.

So this time I am going to challenge myself – to be true to myself no matter what. If I love painting so much I will have to make the time and effort to complete it so that I am not left feeling guilty at the end of it. My next ones going to be all detail oriented. So wish me luck !!!

Madness

“There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness” – Friedrich Nietzsche

The fight with my inner sloth was finally worth it. I have never painted such huge projects so fast. This was completed in just 4 days and looks like the long gap I had has its own positives. I had some new ideas but true to myself – went crazy with colors 🙂

Happy painting !!!

Self-torture

“Perfection is worth striving for, even if it is unattainable in this life” – Joseph B Wirthlin

The only word that kept ringing in my head while I was doing this piece was “Self-torture – Why Am I doing this to myself” . I started painting in small drawing books so that I can do small projects and finish them quickly. And then I started this one, way back in May. Looks like a simple abstract one but the amount of detail that has gone into it, tested my patience to the core. I am still not fully happy with this but cannot go any longer. I guess Shiva cannot be attained that easily in life or on paper.

Just playing around with Photoshop

Durga

“..If you cannot do great things, do small things in a great way” – Napolean Hill

Drawing in sketchbooks has never been my thing, when I start drawing or coloring, things just get out of proportion. But these days with my busy office schedule I don’t get the conviction enough to finish huge projects hence trying to teach myself to draw small. A drawing book which I can probably carry with myself as well. Wouldn’t that be nice !!!

Realize Vs Identify

“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.” – Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

My human experience since the past 6 month has been quite grueling, maybe the universe was trying to teach me a lot in a short span of time. I was pushed to the limits – mentally and physically. Finally I decided to fall of the edge and quit that job to make time for people and things I love.

This painting is inspired by the contents of the book – Aghora – II Kundalini by Robert E. Svobodha  which talks about self-realization and self-identification among other things. This got me into thinking – while the universe was trying to teach me something (the hard way), was it because of my self-identification /”Ahamkara”/ “ego” that “I” thought “I” can make things better for me. In my next job I think I will try to go with the flow, if I am meant to learn things the hard way let it be so.

Priority

“Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least” – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Recently I was reading this book, “The One Thing” by Gary Keller with Jay Papasan; and got into thinking about priorities and choices. As adults when we have a choice and everything is at our discretion, is there a clear formula for making decisions so that we can make the best decisions for us and not trade them for just any decision?

I found my answer in PRIORITY, as long as we pause and think what really matters to us and let that drive our day/decisions we will have a sense of progress and can avoid getting trapped in busyness.

This painting was inspired by two thoughts –

1. How important our environment is – we should make all effort to keep the earth beautiful as it should be so that we can enjoy living in it.
2. How important our environment is – we should surround ourselves with people who add value to our life’s so that we can stay positive, productive and happy.

Random Thoughts!!!

Simplicity

“No amount of anxiety can change the future, No amount of regret can change the past” – Karen Salmansohn

Peacocks 12″X12″ board

It’s been a while I have painted something, one because of a relocation AGAIN… but more than that I have been overthinking a lot about what to paint and planning for a complicated project, but when I couldn’t come up with anything I just took the board and paint and did a simple art piece – which makes me happy 🙂

Sva-vida

“The beginning of knowledge is the discovery of something we do not understand” – Frank Herbert

Acrylics on a 12″ X 12″ board

I am seriously running out of ideas, this the best I could come up with after months of break.

Lake Kailash Manasarovar

One of the early acrylic works, trying to bring out the shades which didn’t seem to work that well.

OM Namah Shivay

Rajasthani Woman

“Perform all work carefully, guided by compassion” – Ved Vyasa                 (The Bhagavat Gita)

Acrylics on 16″ X 24″ canvas board

Festive

“Be as you wish to be seem” – Socrates