Vijay Kumar Sawhney - exploring the abstract, by Minhazz Majumdar

Strange planetary bodies suspended in swirling cloudscapes, the heavens in motion – such is the response evoked when you first see Vijay Kumar Sawhney’s art works. This feeling is further reinforced by the artist’s explanation of his art “My art represents the mind speeding through the vast cosmos, glimpsing many beautiful worlds and new fascinating universes”. A successful astrologer and magician, Sawhney’s fascination for the occult is evident in his art.

A former bank manager and businessman by profession, Sawhney, now 70 years old, was always fascinated by art. He was in fact advised by a spiritual guru to take up art when he was young but the rigors of working life never allowed him time to pursue any artistic endeavor. Sawhney began creating art in 2006, after his retirement. He began by making collages, cutting forms and shapes from magazines and calendars, pasting them and embellishing them in different ways. A tarot card reader told him that his forte lay in abstract art. Fired by this advice, Sawhney began experimenting with inks, paints, paper, carbon black and various glues to create unusual art effects. Teasing and prodding paint and ink across paper, experimenting with various effects such as the crackled finish and the shadow finish, Sawhney is in the process of defining his artistic vocabulary.

A true outsider artist and totally untrained, Sawhney is an intuitive painter, who lets his lifetime of studying the supernatural guide him in creating his art. Abstract his forms maybe, but he sees in them creatures and objects of known and the unknown worlds, beautiful divine beings as well as frightening monsters. He believes his life as an artist has just begun and there are many more worlds for him to discover in his art.

For more information on Vijay Kumar Sawhney, click here (his work is available for sale on this site)

Kyoko Okubo - three new works

Three new works by Kyoko Okubo that will be on exhibition at Mobilia Gallery, Cambridge, MA, during the month of December, 2008