"Everyone who renders directly and honestly whatever drives him to create is one of us." thus spake the abstract painter... Words, emotions, reviews, point of views can not do complete justice to encapsulate a creative enquiry. At times it feels the work of art has broken out into a stream of melodies from the harping of images, brushstrokes, juxtaposition of elements and the streaming of colours impossible to imagine; they would be applied in that very way. Godavarthi Venkatesh has come a long way from As works on vibrant still lives ten years ago.
Venkatesh reaches out to add colour to his palette, as an innate spontaneous call. He has the ability to make flowers burst out in sprays of colour, in an enchanting garden that has an unique optical play as forms of trees, flowers and bushes developed in brush strokes, lines, dots and textures could be visualized from afar and near, simultaneously. In this sense As works gain an unusual dynamism as A collates opposing elements and juxtaposes them with great delicacy.
His nature-scapes are often presented as if they are aerial views. depicting or evoking the appearance of a landscape from a perspective above it, usually from a considerable distance, as it might be viewed from an aircraft or spacecraft. This form of aerial view landscapes are found in ancient aboriginal paintings of Australia, as the painters would often climb up a higher plane and look at the landscape from a vantage point.
they created "country" landscapes, that are essentially aerial landscapes depicting their country, showing ancestral paths to watering holes and sacred sites. In the 20th century; aerial landscapes came in vogue as a result of modern development: the discovery and use of air transport which allowed the experience of actual overhead views of land expanses. With the advent of balloon travel in the 19th century, aviators began to learn what landscapes and buildings really looked like from the sky. Venkatesh is inspired by his travel experiences to distant continents and has integrated the interesting way of looking at the landscape from up in the air alongside the experience of feeling, seeing, touching the earth -enchantress, with his feet on the ground. He looks carefully to balance his spontaneous application with, a sense of deliberation in creating patterns and designs to render a character to the space, he goes on to create. It is like taking a walk in an enchanted park wherein, each space is made special by the bent of the path, undulating and plain, the flower beds against the meandering stream. Riding on the expressing lines; trees, flowers, bright and attractive colors, his imaginary landscapes are perhaps reconciliations of the happenings in his mind's garden and the places he visit. Ready to burst out in a song of the spring or a summer rupture. His palette is not one that is premeditated, he reaches out as he recalls each colour. Characterized by the use of intense tonal hues, which becomes the dominant feature of the resultant work of art, playing a more pronounced role. In this act of his, a true colourist is revealed. 'This tendency in painting was premiered by French Impressionism in the late 19th century, and came to prominence in the work of the Fauvists in the early 20th century. It has since surfaced in a variety of individual styles and art movements'. In the Indian folk traditions and miniatures, colourism is endowed with symbolic reference. Although Venkatesh engages himself with modernist contemplations and his colours are not symbolic references to mythologies yet it does have a personal reference to the message he delivers through his spread of warm hues of yellow, orange, pink, purple, magenta, green and blue. 'The environment we live in influences our creative process. When we experience variations of all possible nature in each compartment of life; sounds, tastes, colors, smells, journeys interactions, they evoke a variety of feelings within us and in turn these sensory experiences invade our creative process.'
Interestingly enough, many art forms use similar evocative vocabulary across art disciplines. Music, painting, drama and architecture use terms such as repetition, diversity, passion, cadence, conversation, equilibrium, harmony and so on. Some people can actually hear color, therefore they are easily influenced by music.
Needless to say the delicate lines created by brush strokes and the application of strong colours, the demeanor of the human forms; essentially female forms, communicate through their expressions and movement of fingers and hands in Venkatesh's paintings. Their bodies melt into the vibrant garden becoming part of the landscape. The narrative of the expression and the undulating, abstracted land forms, the fibrous delineation in his works are a response to the serious learning of some of the painterly genres of the art historical panorama. The genres are actors donning the hat at different perspectives to evoke the story of art in his oeuvre. The human form in Venkatesh's work is very subtly played upon without much apparent distortions. The deployment of colors across all hues and tones do convey a variety of experiences.
Throughout in his figurative images one does come across emotionally charged portraits in outdoors. Themes and styles from art history are studied in relation with his ruminations. Expressionists, colourists, fauvists, abstractionists and figurists jolt our senses and connects us to the journey of the artist. The representation of the artist's emotional response to a scene would form the basis of the Expressionists' artistic interpretations. Venkatesh is living, absorbing creating and evolving his experience of art history. The theme of individual alienation hangs like a heady scent in the summery opus of Venkatesh's colour palette, and solo figures, or two people looking away from each other into the distance. Sifting through the point, his images make of solitude. Does music play though his art? Through the grass like split strokes through the spirals dashes, blobs and dots? Are they super codes to a secret melody within him? Does his brush tangos along the canvas playing jazz with colours while responding to this special music? Or are his paintings indicators of change of season around and within him? His works mirror his passion and he enjoys this dialogue as it creates a resonance of affirmation that there is rhythm, rejuvenation and resplendence in life.
