Art with the silver brush

KOCHI: Who would have thought art could be found in a sanitary pad or Deadpool could be a Theyyam character? Instagram became a launch pad for Silver Brush, run by artist Chris Blair Vincent who experiments with his artworks. 

A bleeding girl and lotus flowers blooming from her vagina drawn on a sanitary pad became a salient and highly appreciated artwork. Chris relates the work with the sacred feminine quality. 
“As an artist, I wanted to spread the message that menstrual bleeding is not impure. The lotus I drew was a way to tell the world menstruation is not a taboo rather it’s something divine, as a lotus stands for the symbol of purity according to the Hindu belief,” he said. 
Exceptional and exotic, his artworks mostly have a much deeper meaning and essence hiding in the background. 

Started as a hobby during his school days, Chris grew passionate about art. By the time he was doing his engineering at Chennai, he got attached to art so much he decided to embrace it as his career, “It was a struggle at the beginning as an artist and there wasn’t much stability. I needed to balance it and so I decided to get into designing. After getting out of college, I did a short course on designing. By 2017, I was freelancing as a graphic designer, and then later was working as UI/UX designer at Fortune Cookie UX designs in Delhi. I quit my job last year to focus more on my art,” he said. By opening ‘Silver Brush Studio’ in Chennai, he hopes to go commercial with his art and do commissioned works.

His artworks ‘Fusion Series’ made him popular as an evolving artist. “I wanted to experiment with the Western and the cultural side of Kerala. That’s when I came up with the works including Joker as a kathakali artist, Deadpool-theyyam and Harley Quinn (from Suicide Squad) as a bharatanatyam dancer. The Deadpool-theyyam was a surprisingly crazy project for me considering the similarities of the visual features the theyyam dancer and the superhero shared,” said Chris. 

Giving importance to emotions, he considers it as an inspiration. “Emotions play a vital role in shaping an artist. Art should be seen as a therapy to calm oneself,” he said. Chris’ moniker ‘Silver Brush’ was a deliberate choice to make himself known. “An artist knows how to present his work to his audience so that his actual message reaches them,” said Chris.

Chris has always tried incorporating the elements of nature into his artworks. “A considerable amount of effort is put into research for my paintings. Applying something thought-provoking in my works always fascinates me, especially the triangle which is a basic building element in a design,” he said. 
Immensely optimistic, Chris pleasantly accepts comments and criticism on his works. 

(With inputs from Akhil R Kumar and Aakash Hari)