Scaffold an artist trio

Shinod Akkaraparambi, Sujeeth Kumar and Vijay Pichumani have already made a series of five art shows under the title Scaffold. After a brief hiatus, the trio is back with a new set of their works which are majorly inspired from their memories and perceptions. Scaffold, an umbrella term for their series and the group.  which was started about four years ago, is a space where the trio interact and share ideas about their artistic journey.

Shinod, an alumnus of Fine Arts from Universal School of Fine Arts in Kozhikode, shares about how the group was first formed, “I am from Kerala while the other two are from Tamil Nadu. They are graduates from Government College of Arts and Crafts, Chennai. We met in the city when I used to come here for my study and research on artworks and we started doing shows together. So, far we have done about four shows in Chennai and one in Bengaluru.” Talking about his art installation, which predominantly uses dogs, he says, “We use the word ‘dog’ to swear at someone. Dog is used as a derogatory word in that instance but at the same time we pet them and show our love towards them. This is an ironical condition of humans. So, I tried to use dogs as the metaphor for the human condition.”

Sujeeth Kumar has done three works for the group show, which are significantly affected by his travels and the numerous mountains he has visited so far. Sujeeth elaborates, “For one installation, I have used a wheel to signify time. And another work — ‘Memories of mountains’ — is a result of my fondness towards mountains. The latest one ‘The trees dance as fire engulfing it…’ is an encounter I had when I saw the smoke imprints from the candle light on the wall and it stuck to me like trees moving according to the wind flow.” The other member of Scaffold group, Vijay Pichumani, who also studied with Sujeeth, has been part of many other group shows and he has also 56th National Award for Woodcut Print.
(The artshow strats from June 2 at Art Houz, Alwarpet)