At first edition of Pune Art Festival, the life of Aarey, the physics of Big Bang & more

The festival venue has metal sculptures by Prabhakar Singh from Pune, a scientist by day and artist by night, while Anu Raghunathan, another artist from the city, created works that were a perfect intersection between art, design and science. “I work at the National Chemical Laboratory and my art work talks about the Big Bang, the origin of life and life as you know it today,” said Raghunathan.

Her works include paintings on canvases that depict scientific facts like the mass-energy equivalence, and also depict the state of the world, as it faces climate change and global turmoil, as well as circular canvases with acrylic paints, depicting petri dishes with bacterial strains.

Mumbai-based artist Kumar Misal has made an artwork to convey the life of Aarey forest and how one needs to conserve it.

While artist Bijay Biswal from Nagpur is showcasing a series on Indian Railways and the ghats, done on water colours and acrylic medium, Pune-based artist Shibani Vaishali Rajapurkar has her series ‘A walk in my garden’, which encourages viewers to focus on the simple joys of life, rather than everyday stress.

“Colours often depict moods. I was once at a point in my life when I used dark and violent colours like red and dark blue. I brought about a change by using lighter tones of yellow, pink and white,” she said.

Apart from the art display by both professional and amateur artists, the festival also aims to nudge other senses, with an array of food stalls and musical performances. “Chef Parag Kanhere will attempt cooking a five-course meal while blindfolded. We will also have live performances by Raju Kulkarni and Vaishali Samant and a demonstration by Vishnu Mardekar,” said Kenjale.