Bengaluru celebrates the fete of art and colour at Chitra Santhe

BENGALURU: A celebration of colours and art unfolded on a chilly Sunday morning at

Chitrakala Parishath

(CKP), which saw an estimated 3.5 lakh visitors buying artworks worth Rs 2.1 crore.

Chitra Santhe, the

annual art fair

, was inaugurated a day after the festival of harvest,

Sankranthi

, here with 1,300 artists from across the country showcasing their work. From modern art to contemporary work, cartoons, line drawings and craft, and from pottery to live art and photo-realism, a wide variety of work kept the art lovers engaged.

Arun Kumar Yadav, 27, sitting patiently opposite the college, was a crowd stopper.Already smeared with paint from head to toe, he let passersby paint him all over again. A 2016 CKP g raduate, Arun said his perfor mance art was an attempt to display the apathy of people in today's world.“I wanted to prove that no matter how much people try to live peacefully and kept to themselves, others won't let them.“

“...People have been painting my face and probing my body all day . I have never seen so many cameras. A lot of people fell at my feet, some gave me money , while others pitied me,“ said Arun said, as a wom an posed with a paint brush to his face.

Lavanya Boopa thy, a homemaker thy, a homemaker from Banashanka ri, who has been attending the event for the past four years with her two k i d s i n t ow said, “I like the energy of the place and my kids also love it. There's something for everyone. They enjoy getting their portraits sketched. In fact, they do it every year.“

And, yes, there was something for everyone. Renowned artist Sudarshan Shetty, who came for the first time as a guest, said the event was a great initiative, envisaging taking art to the common man. “It also raises questions about confining art to academic circles. It highlights the point that art can be displayed at streets so as in museums and galleries,“ he said.

Concurring with his views, Malleswaram resident Gayathri, 50, said that the experience at the art fair was great.“While I picked up artworks for my house within my budget of Rs 500, it was an opportunity to see different types of art in one place,“ she said.

But notwithstanding the patrons, Faiyaz Hussain, 77, rues not having a market for his work. A resident of Bas av e s h w a r a Nagar, Hussain has been cutting paper into intricate patterns and complex shapes since he was 13.“Business is not as good as it used to be. People are more interested in the ideas and art of younger people. They appreciate my work but stop short of buying. I worked from October to December to create all the pieces I have brought here. My work used to be popular but now there are not enough takers,“ he says. Appreciating CKP's sustained efforts to provide a platform to artists, CM Siddaramaiah said, “The government's support to art will persist and CKP would have a sprawling second campus by the next Chitra Santhe scheduled on January 7, 2018.The government has granted Rs 20 crore for the CKP Fine Arts College and Rs 12 crore has already been released.“

Soon after his speech, Siddaramaiah stopped by at the stall of Kerala artist Sunitha Thrippanikara, which attracted attention because of the sublime quality of paintings by the physically challenged artist, holding the brush in her mouth.

B L Shankar, president, CKP, said that construction for the first phase of the state-of-art campus in Raja rajeshwari Nagar will start in March and be completed by the end of t h e y e a r.

The cam pus will be spread a cross 1.4 acres and cost nearly Rs 35 crore.

“We are planning the constric tion of the campus in two phases and the second phase will be completed in four years from now,“ Shankar added.

The event also saw Union minister D V Sadananda Gowda and noted Kannada writer Chandrashekhara Kambara attending it.