Shades of women's lives on canvas

Thiruvananthapuram: Insurance professional B Jayasree prefers to paint women, that too in shades that convey reality than fantasy. "I paint their miseries, hardships and helplessness," said Jayasree, an officer with the Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) who finds time from the hectic schedule to paint.
The paintings exhibited by Jayasree at Alliance Francaise's art gallery here bore testimony to her judicious use of colours to create a style of painting that is partially abstract, something which she has created with her years of experiments on canvas.
"I do not travel much like most artists, but tend to be around Thiruvananthapuram. But from the little travelling I do in the district, I pick up a variety of themes for my paintings," said Jayashree, who is a homemaker and mother of two. "Women I feel are moored to miseries. A lot of worries surround them and it is this tragedy of their lives that I have attempted to portray on canvas," the middle-aged woman added.
Her inspiration to paint mostly comes from contemporary themes. For example, a painting that depicts fisherwomen looking at their crumbled huts after the monsoon waves destroyed them was something that she picked up from a newspaper article on sea erosion.
Jayasree said she had a keen interest in painting since her childhood. Her works were dominated by real imagery. But her stint as a student under artists Ravisankar and B D Dathan has refined her abilities as an artist.
"I have learned a lot under these two artists. They have introduced me to several new styles and how to express various themes in each one of them," Jayasree said.
The exhibition titled 'Untitled' at the Alliance de Francise will be open to the public from 10am to 5.30pm till August 4.