Artist Vijit Pillai has come back to Hyderabad with an exhibition of his work after seven years and this is not the only reason for celebration. The renowned artist, who is known for his digital painting artwork, has for the first time displayed his hand-painted artwork and he wanted to do it here more than anywhere else in the country. The art display titled The Maharaja and The Last Supper brims with Vijit’s talent and his personal and professional experience translated on canvas.
“I called it The Maharaja and Last Supper because they were two of my favourite artworks that were displayed there and two completely different paintings. One was The Maharaja, which I took from reference that I found from Maharaja Duleep Singh, the last Maharaja of the Sikh Kingdom. There is a very majestic picture which I made into colourful portrait. The other one was The Last Supper, which is my interpretation of Da Vinci’s Last Supper,” says Vijit.
The fact that the wellknown artist decided to change his medium of expression from digital painting to handmade painting is in itself an interesting element of his work. Out of 20 paintings on display, almost 10 are hand painted.
“I was an oil painter, long-long time ago, almost 40 years ago. Then I gave it up. Then I thought I should try my hand at using brush tools again. There is some great advantage of digital art and I also wanted to see how good my hand painted artwork is. These art works are a reflection of what I have been through in the last two years. I have been through a lot of changes in the personal and professional front. It kind of encompassed all different moods and expressions that I have been through these years,” he says.
Like every artist, every piece of his work is dear to Vijit. However, after enough emphasis, he reveals that there are two paintings which are very close to his heart. “Actually, there is one called, In Memory of Elizabeth Reed, which is named after a song with the same name, by the American band The Allman Brothers. This painting is about somebody I knew many years ago and who is not there anymore. There is another one called Solitude,” he says.
Every artist has a muse or an inspiration. For Vijit, who is popular in the corporate sectors of Delhi, Hyderabad and Bengaluru for his artwork, the inspiration is evolution. “The one inspiration that I have is evolving and never getting stuck. I got stuck one time with the kind of work I did and I decided to come out of it and never be stereotyped,” he says and goes to add, “In fact, when people walk into my exhibition, I want time to think that there are three four artists’ work on display.”
