Portraits are his visiting cards

Kozhikode-based artist N. Shargeeth likes to do portraits of celebrities. His obsession doesn’t end there. He also gifts them to famous personalities visiting Kozhikode. From Ronaldinho to Abhishek Bachan, the artist has impressed several of them, who had come to the city. He draws inspiration to work on more projects from the response he receives from them.

It all started a couple of years ago, when actor Kanika visited Kozhikode for a shoot. “I was exhibiting my works at the hotel where Kanika stayed. While going through my works, most of them portraits, she asked me whether I could draw the portrait of her child. When my work was finished she was happy and I gifted it to her.

Actor Biyon is my friend and it was he who gave me the idea to gift the portraits of celebrities to them. I was able to meet about 15 Malayalam film personalities and several others this way,” he says. Several celebrities have bought his other works also. “Other than portraits, I do abstracts. I use both oil and acrylic . Several actors including Kunchacko Boban have bought my paintings from my exhibitions. The positive comments are a good inspiration for me to continue my art works. I think it was a rare opportunity to meet Ronaldinho and Abhishek Bachan. Abhishek enquired a lot about my work. However, I was a little disappointed that I could not converse with Ronaldinho because of the language barrier,” he said.

He also gifts them to famous personalities visiting Kozhikode.

Shargeeth has been exhibiting his works at the two five-star hotels in Kozhikode — Gateway Hotel and Raviz Kadavu. “Most of the celebrities stay in these hotels and this has helped me to interact with them,” he says.  The artist, who has conducted several exhibitions in the city, has also appeared in small roles in ad films and movies.