Cloud kissed skies, gently flowing streams, swathes of green over hill and plain, waves splashing against the rocks. The sights, sounds and scents of the landscapes Shivakumar Sunagar has presented in The Spirit of the Land stir nostalgia and evoke a wanderlust for the yet unseen.
“The places on my canvases are not exact depictions; they are inspired by my travels,” says Shivakumar. The artist who paints from memory without sketching on location, adds there are elements of the imaginary and emotional in them as well.
The works on display comprising acrylic on canvas and watercolour on paper have been executed over the past year, and the artist says they were created from the emotions evoked by the places he visited. “You paint a tree and it looks real enough, but the image also depicts the rush of the feelings I had both when I saw the tree and when I began recreating it.”
“Emotions are heavy and layered, and often one falls short of words when describing the depth of intense feeling. This is why in my work, there is a presence of abstractions in the realistic. You cannot explain an abstract in words; it is what one feels,“ he says.
Shivakumar Sunagar | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Shivakumar, who makes it a point to paint a piece every day, says he commits the lights and sounds of a place to memory and later, adds his own composition of colours and creativity to a piece.
Even the briefest of glances at Shivakumar’s work tell you he is a nature lover, but surprisingly he says both the city and country fascinate him. “Both are beautiful in their own way. We do live in cities and we can’t write them off as being devoid of beauty. They hold an appeal which is why we choose to live here or else we’d all be living in the forests.”
“Both have their own aesthetic; you cannot compare a rose and a sunflower, they each have their own unique charm.”
Two years ago, he cycled all over Karnataka for close to two months, collecting inspiration along the way. “I started from Bengaluru where I stay, and rode to Gulbarga, up the Konkan coast, and returned via Kodagu and Mysore,” he says, adding that he enjoys the entire process — beginning with his travels and starting on a canvas, to adding the final touches to a piece.
From The Spirit of the Land by Shivakumar Sunagar | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Shivakumar who hails from Nagara in Shivamogga district, travels throughout the country and has lived for extended periods of time in Gujarat, Delhi and Mumbai, before settling in Bengaluru.
The Spirit of the Land by Shivakumar Sunagar will be on display at Gallery Time and Space, Lavelle Road till March 22. Entry free, Mondays closed.
Published - March 12, 2026 08:35 pm IST
