Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa has remained artists' muse for long but no one has painted her using techniques of legendary artist Raja Ravi Varma. Meet artist A.P. Sreethar who has drawn inspiration from Ravi Varma's style for his upcoming show The Cadet Coalition—a collection featuring Mona Lisa in different avatars. Through what he calls a cultural crossover series, Sreethar hopes to captivate viewers as they catch a glimpse of how Mona Lisa would have looked had she been Indian. The show features 72 mixed media paintings, of which 30 can be viewed at Italian Embassy Cultural Centre till May 31.
"This series is inspired by Raja Ravi Varma and his technique of art. Though he used to play with a melange of colours, I have restricted myself to monochrome shades and have given Mona Lisa only black and white. This was done so that one can easily concentrate on the painting without getting distracted with brighter tones. The idea was to hold the attention of viewer so that he gets time to embrace the beauty of Mona Lisa and not the colour of her saree."
The artworks have been created using acrylic colours and air brush technique. However, unlike the original works, the Chennai-based artist has shown many avatars of Mona Lisa in and added variety to her hair. "If you will see her original portraits, you will see that her hair rested on her shoulders. But I wanted to build an Indian connection, so I styled the hair into a bun. Even Raja Ravi Varma also used to give ample emphasis on the hair of the women in his portraits."
Sreethar hasn't acquired a degree in art and is a self-trained artist who has been painting his favourite character since 1999. He has already created 700 portraits of Mona Lisa so far.
Though the shows will keep him busy, the artist has bigger plans. He says, he wants to open a 'Museum of Lisa' in Singapore. "It will feature 1,000 paintings of Mona Lisa, all created by me. It will include 41 zones and people will also get their personal portrait before exiting it."
Sreethar has many museums that he caters to, the first one being Click Art Museum followed by a 3D art museum. Besides this, he also has a vintage camera museum to his name, where he has displayed his collection of over 7,000 cameras. But his heart will always belong to Mona Lisa.