What's in a name?

Are you a Mary? An Ellen? Sudheer or Sana? Do you connect with your name? Do you just get used to it  or does it define who you are.
A manuscript I struggled with through prolonged bouts of procrastination has suddenly come alive; all it needed was a new identity. And whilst I still feel I am a Mazarine, I wonder if my path moving forward will allow me the same level of comfort and connection I feel with my name or will it have me choose a new one?

Hunger Games - Another disturbing dystopian!

I never read the books, never intended to and against my better judgement, saw the movie. It was disturbing to see violence touted in such a random manner. Teens killing each other; playing games of the goriest kind! Why then are we shocked and up in arms when we hear of killings and shootings in schools when this is what our children are exposed to? What happened to the good old "Once upon a time?" stories.
And whilst I accept that even cartoons like Tom and Gerry were violent, these kind of movies is taking violence to an entirely new level; projected through every source and medium; from video games to movies.
Have we lost our sense of obligation towards out young generation who seem to be growing up in an era where violence is 'okay?' Dystopian novels are being churned by the dozens each author/movie maker getting more creative than the other, working on a genre that only signifies death and destruction.
Why hasn't anyone projected humour or comedy for our future? Why are we bracing ourselves for destruction and violence with such certainty?
Do we really need gory fantasy? Isn't the world turning bizarre enough? Do we need to inject more of the reality we live by titling it as 'fantasy?' It's time we brought comedy to the fore, we could all use a good old fashioned laugh!

Filling in the blanks...

It has been several weeks now that I have had to yo-yo between a cow, a hippie and a mandala and come back in a full circle to continue my procrastination over medium, surface and size!

Planning a new collection on a single thought is a time consuming disaster. And whilst art is fulfilling and rewarding it comes with its own baggage of frustrations amidst piles of unfinished canvases, maimed brushes and lost paint.

Advice for those stuck and loathe to paint a one off? Just do it, fill in those creative blocks with experimental work! It almost always leads to an interesting body of work.

When our imagination led us...

Remember those days when all we wanted to do was doodle? In class, in a gym period, sitting outside the principal’s office; a pen was all we needed, the surface was everywhere; our arms, legs, hands, walls newspapers and notebooks. What about those smiley faces under our signature? And the little aliens and Martians drawn with immaculate detail; complete with crosshatch shading?
And how about all those wonderfully crafted stories, albeit lacking in correct grammar but certainly creative enough to get an A+, even in today’s world I dare say! The words flowed, the ideas in such abundance that it would be a frantic race to compete with the bell that marked the end of the English period; the writing turning incredibly tiny and illegible in the last few sentences.
Clearly it was an age where we dared to break the norms, dared to disobey. There were no barriers that we cared to observe. We questioned everything and everyone!
So what happens to us as adults? Inundated with books on writing, creating art, books on unleashing the writer’s block, the artist block…where does it stop? Reading a book to understand the writing, looking at a painting to understand the style, we have simply lost the art of enjoying this simple pleasure.
Why haven’t we just gone back to the un’adult’erated days of our childhood where all we did was dream and then made them a reality on paper, any paper.
Go back to being a child or let the child in you surface…and lead you.

Learning through the arts...

Art has no boundaries or barriers of culture, race, creed or class. It recognizes the language of beauty; be it a movement in dance, a cord on a musical instrument or brush stroke on a blank canvas. Art in any form strikes a cord and it remains; reverberating with astounding clarity. I recently completed the Artist Education Foundation course and with its completion began a whole a new journey for me...but before I share some of these amazing moments with you, I want to know, "How do you define art?"

I wonder... a tribute to my dad and my aunt; two people I loved and lost to Cancer

My childhood was spent in a happy little lane that lay nestled in the bustling city of Bombay (now Mumbai). Summer holidays were spent at my aunt's place where we babysat our two young cousins and walked down to Snowman's for ice-cream. College life was spent in a beautiful building, still used as a prop for many Bollywood films...but the glossy magazines of the West with their coke ads and fancy technology got to us and we moved on, out of the city and our country. Leaving behind wonderful memories of a happy childhood, chasing the American dream. The visit to my aunt's (masi's) place no longer just a bus ride in the big double decker BEST buses, it was a two and half hour flight!...and we moved further away, from the Middle East to North America...now I live in Toronto, a beautiful city I call home, where the air is clean and fresh and I don't have to worry about power shortages or wake up early to fill the water tank. But...I am not home when a loved one suffers. I am not there to sit by their side and relive all those memories spent together with them, hold their hand or tell them "I love you and will miss you when you are gone" So I wonder, why do we go out looking for happiness, leaving behind everything that gave us that in the first place? I wonder when people say, "thanks to technology the world is shrinking" I disagree, because we rely on technology, we have created such a vast distance amongst ourselves. I never got to say goodbye to my dad; I was fourteen hours away on a transatlantic flight. Yesterday, I never got to say bye to my aunt before she passed away; once again I was too far away...So, I wonder, what is the definition of 'home' and where is home? My husband, kids, mom and siblings are here in Toronto with me. My grandmother, uncles, aunts and cousins thousands of miles away...do we really need to scatter around the world? Can we not find what we need right on our doorstep? I wonder...

Several layers - steps to building a body of work

It isn't just about starting from a blank canvas...art should be inspired from what you see around you. Use it to tell a message. They say the pen is a powerful instrument, I say, so is the brush...remember, 'A picture is worth a thousand words!'

Even writers say, 'Show, don't tell!'