Friday, March 29, 2024 | Ramadan 18, 1445 H
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EDITOR IN CHIEF- ABDULLAH BIN SALIM AL SHUEILI

Camels for therapy, art for peace, and doodle for meditation

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Three talented artists have come together to exhibit their work for the New Year. Rebeca Nigrinis, Tarini Agarwal and Erica Barrow Navis are accomplished artists with different concept towards their work. As 2017 comes to a close, the trio has come out with unique works of art to round off the year.


Rebeca has painted camels, Tarini has come out with a canvas diptych on peace, while, Erica, inspired by the festive season, has created doodles.


A Colombian artist in Muscat, Rebeca Nigrinis, loves camels. She has painted the mammals and has combined the iconic Middle Eastern camel for the Christmas season. “I paint them on wood with acrylics and add a liquid glass coating to make it shiny and durable which took just a few days to produce,” she says. Rebeca has been painting murals and canvasses for over 12 years in different countries.


An Indian artist, Tarini Agarwal, who works on expressive abstract art, has a painting on ‘world peace.’ She has tried to paint soft rich colours that bring out the meaning of peace to her. Moving away from the obvious, her work is about mixed media on canvas exploring the softness of the state of peace.


Tarini has come out with a diptych where each of them can be separated as an individual canvas of 30x60 cms. “It is this place of being that I strive for, from this flows my creative energy, allowing me to paint,” she says confidently.


Erica Barrow Navis has been doodling for years and this comes naturally. She uses Christmas elements as part of her doodle namely candy canes, angels, as inspiration for her art.


A marketing professional, she also blogs, enjoys brush lettering, which is a contemporary form of calligraphy using them as part of her art. She is inspired by doodle art for New Year, using the elements in design and personalising gift tags and greeting cards. “I also have albums dedicated to my Christmas art, digital art, painting and Mandalas,” Erica mentions.


For Rebeca, painting camels is an excellent therapy, as each of her camels has a special name to go with it. ‘Faith, Peace and Hope’ were produced during very special periods where she was feeling lonely and home sick.


She has always liked camels and during this time of the year when she is usually home sick and emotional, she found in her inner self that faith, peace and hope she was longing for. ‘Fancy dress’ and ‘Aquamarine’ were two camels on square canvas which reflects the happiness of the season. She sold all the camels one of which was shipped as far as Norway.


Rebeca winds up the year with excellent sales for her work from the recent Souq es Sabt market at Al Mouj Muscat. By yearend, painting camels keeps her fully engaged. All of them always have a story behind.


“It’s like my art studio pets and come to life with different personalities and backgrounds,” she confesses. She is really overwhelmed by responses from Souq es Sabt and from people wanting to know more about her art. “It has been many hours inside the studio preparing for the market which is a great opportunity to get showcased in Muscat and I’ve created new pieces to display.” Rebeca also painted nativity scenes on wood with acrylic paint and added many details to make bright colourful camels.


As an artist, Tarini has moved away from the obvious and worked on soft rich colours that bring out the meaning of peace to her. She has assiduously explored the softness and gentleness of the state of peace.


“Nature all around us shows us that we all can achieve this state of being. We see it in sunrise, flowers and trees. Simple things that bring joy and in this lies peace,” she adds. “Personally in most situations I choose peace over being right and this has served me well.”


Peace, according to Tarini, is an easy rhetoric. “So easy to talk about and propound. It is the one thing we need most in the world and the one thing which is so easily lost. Coexistence with room for each other to grow and a healthy respect is the only way peace can exist in the light of the current geopolitical and economic environment,” she muses.


Doodling for Erica is a form of meditation which helps quietens her mind and the only time when her thoughts are focused. She tries digital art on iPad pro using Apple pencil and the doodles are done with the same design in mind, using similar colour scheme and techniques.


She also works with UniPin and Sakura pens which are amazing for doodling and loves Sakura Gelly Rolls having started to use water colours recently.


Here’s wishing the talented artists all the best as they explore newer avenues in the coming year.


Liju Cherian


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