Bhubaneswar: The City of Temples is fast emerging as the ‘Mural Capital’ with 3D street artists like Tracy Lee Stum, Anat Ronen, Zee Schindler, Julio Jimenez and Sayak Mitra wielding the brush for Street Art and Mural Project (STAMP) of the Bhubneswar Municipal Corporation.
Tracy, who had visited Odisha capital twice earlier as an ‘Art Ambassador’ of the US government and conducted workshops at Bakul, agreed to curate a 3D mural project with other celebrated artists, all currently based in the USA. They were offered a huge canvas of the sidewalls of flyovers at Vani Vihar, Acharya Vihar, Jayadev Vihar and ID Market.
In 15 days, Tracy herself created one of her biggest murals (110 ft into 24 ft) titled, ‘Over the rainbow’ that celebrated Bhubaneswar as a child-friendly smart city with huge figures of happy children on swings.
Anat Ronen, originally from Israel, painted another huge mural (70 ft into 28 ft) of the endangered pangolin at Acharya Vihar Square and it looks like a huge dinosaur towering over the tiny vehicles to those uninitiated to wildlife. It again creates a 3D illusion as it appears as if the pangolin is stepping out of the flyover. Very aptly, it has been located close to the Natural History Museum because of which the pillars of the Acharya Vihar flyover had paintings of birds.
At the Jayadev Vihar flyover, which is close to Kalinga Stadium, where the Hockey World Cup will be played, predictably the theme is hockey in the 3D mural by Julio Jimenez, originally from Mexico. He has made the inside walls look as if one is actually at the hockey stadium with a game being played and the field seems to extend till the road.
At ID Market turning, Zee Schindler, originally from Brazil, took inspiration from the colourful Indian trucks and presented an illusion of trucks breaking through the flyover wall onto the road. In another 3D illusion, she is presenting huge eco-light bulbs plugged into the flyover wall but reflecting the ecological concerns through images of water conservation, wind energy.
Bakul Foundation, had played a major role in the murals and street art scene of Bhubaneswar, and had got the most prominent murals made for BMC in 2017 with the flyovers at Rajmahal, Acharya Vihar and Jayadev Vihar, in addition to painting on the platform of the railway station and public toilets.
It may be mentioned here that Odisha had a rich tradition of mural painting on walls and Raghurajpur was one of the centres but that has been dying though other art forms such as ’Pattachitra’ have found a new lease of life as they have become popular products that can be purchased and gifted or displayed.
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