City artist paints tribute to Mani Ratnam

Over the decades, veteran filmmaker Mani Ratnam has set the benchmark for iconic love frames in his films. Right from Mouna Raagam to his recent Chekka Chivantha Vaanam, the director has aesthetically portrayed love in his films. As a tribute to the ace director, city-based artist Akshayaa Selvaraj has come up with a calendar, Dear Love.

“Like any other move buff, I am also a huge admirer of Mani Ratnam’s craft. According to me, he is the only director who has showcased love in all its purity in films. He set the benchmark and started the trend of making beautifully shot frames in films. I was thinking of ways in which I could say thank you to the director. And I wanted to make something personal that stays with a person throughout the year. That’s how I zeroed in on creating a curated calendar, ‘Dear Love’,” she says. It is an A4 plus sized calendar with 12 hand-painted artworks.

Though an architect, Akshayaa is more inclined towards creating artworks. She started her artistic journey by making colouring books. “I started the work for the calendar in December 2018 and it took almost two months to complete the project. I took around two to three days to paint one picture. I painted the pictures in handmade cotton papers. But the toughest part was selecting 12 scenes from Mani sir’s iconic films. My friends helped me with this process. We finalised the scenes that are very relatable to the audience. Since I am an architect, I have also picked scenes that added value to the city’s architecture, lighting, nature and so on,” she adds.

Talking about how she recreated Revathi’s scene from Mouna Raagam that was shot in Madras Literary Society, Akshayaa reveals, “Mouna Ragam was released around 30 years ago. Painting that particular scene of Revathi sitting at the Madras Literary Society was kind of surreal for me (Akshayaa is an active volunteer at Madras Literary Society). I’ve used mixed media to create the paintings.” 

The artist says that the calendar is multipurpose. “You can cut the paintings and use them as greeting cards.

I have also included bookmarks, bucket lists, birthday reminders, love goals, and a tracker for each month.”

She has already started working on her next project. “Art should have an intimate conversation with the viewers. So, my next project is more about portraying inner voices in the form of painting,” she sums up.