A journey through abstraction at Art Houz

At Art Houz, the walls come alive — not with portraits or landscapes but with the language of abstraction. Here, colours converse, merge, and integrate to create shapes and forms that tell stories of their own. Titled, Echoes in Colour, the ongoing exhibition brings together the diverse works of 17 artists. Some canvases feel familiar, like fragments of home; others bring in a sense of what a home can be.

Take, for instance, Karishma Wadhwa’s series titled Opus, inspired by her travels around the world and her experiences moving between cities like Chennai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, and Mumbai. “I observed that people are often obsessed with their origins and view everything through the lens of their home and identity. I realised that when I stepped back and viewed the entire world, my home and identity are just a small speck. The realisation became a key aspect of my work.” In her paintings, viewers initially see structures and forms, but upon stepping back, they notice the smaller details, colours and hidden underlayers. 

“We brought together artists who work around the theme of the exhibit, where they are not creating some kind of form, but are letting colours and textures speak more on the canvas,” says Poornima Shivram, curator of the exhibition.

Chennai-based Isaiarasi Annamalai’s series Akash, delves into the concept of space, exploring the ever-changing nature of forms within it. The different shades of blue in the series represent the shifting quality of space — the light and dark, near and far, known and unknown. “Through the dissolving forms and the subtle play of colours and textures, I aim to invite the viewer into a journey of discovery, where the boundaries between form and void are blurred, and where space itself becomes a living, breathing entity.”

In Pooja Si’s series Abstraction in Kaleidoscope, we are instantly taken to our childhood days of holding a kaleidoscope in our hands and the joy of witnessing the shifting colours and forms. “My experiments and study with geometry of abstract forms have gradually led me to look at the kaleidoscope as a point of reference and as a device that creates beautiful forms, patterns, geometrical shapes and colours. I am wholly appealing to the concept of sattva guna, an Indian philosophy that speaks about purity, goodness, and harmony, in the painting with the use of bold colours and shapes to define joy, intelligence, positivity, divinity, and pleasure.”

In S Anand’s Woven Hues series, he uses Sgraffito technique to create an Impasto style abstract, where he applies thick coats layers of colours in two layers to get the textural effect. The result is a piece that has an underlying coating of contrasting colours. “To get a result of sgraffito technique, I scratch the top layer of paint, while still wet, to reveal a bottom layer of a different colour. In the technique, I can use a variety of tools, like the edge of a painting knife, the tip of a brush handle, a wire brush, or any sharp tool.”

Through these works, a dialogue of colour, textures and emotions emerges–a reminder that art exists in all forms and feelings. 

Echoes in Colour is on till November 5 at Art Houz, Nungambakkam, from 10am to 6:30pm. Entry free.