As a toddler, the walls of her house were Rithika B's canvas. Fast-forward to today, twenty years later, she is a professional ‘live artist’. What is live art, you may ask? Rithika can sketch portraits of people by observing them from a distance and that too in front of a live audience!
Recognising their young child’s innate flair for art, her parents even sent her to an art school. Amazed by Rithika’s talent, the art teacher called her a prodigy and advised her parents to enrol her in an advanced art course. “I had already excelled at pot painting and Thanjavur painting by the time I was in Grade 7!” says the 21-year-old who is pursuing an MBA in Apparel Management at Sardar Vallabhai Patel International School of Textiles & Management, Coimbatore.
But Rithika's ‘artistic journey’ was not a cakewalk. Rithika has an undiagnosed swelling in her right arm, which makes it difficult for her to paint and draw, but she does it anyway because it is her passion. “I have had this throbbing pain for a long time now. I realised the pain only when I had to do more than 22 pencil sketches within four days. The strain had induced the pain,” she says adding that she has seen more than 25 doctors till now, to no avail.
Despite all the pain and the sleepless nights that it results in, Rithika has never stopped herself from accepting challenges. One such incredible opportunity was presenting a ‘live art sketch’ to a couple at their reception. "A friend of mine wanted me to do a live art session at her friend’s wedding. It took me an hour to complete the work as I had the outline of them sketched already. When I presented the sketch to them, they were overjoyed," she recalls.
Rithika is not just a pencil shading artist par excellence, she also aces many other art forms as well. "I have tried my hand at fabric painting, warli art, glass painting, pot painting and so on. My idea is to inculcate all these elements of art into fashion and set a trend," explains Rithika who is a BTech Fashion Technology graduate.
According to Rithika, nothing fills her with more happiness than teaching it to others. Till date, she has conducted numerous workshops for school children. “While in college, I founded a start-up, KCT 2.O, that is aimed at promoting art education, along with a group of like-minded artists," she points out. An alumnus of Kumaraguru College of Technology, she says that KCT 2.O is now completely managed by their juniors, but she does help them with ideation and procuring raw materials.
Rithika also accept customised orders through her Instagram handle, Rithu_arts. “Most of my customers prefer caricatures as a gifting option these days. But the sad part is that people give fake orders just to upset us, which is not funny," concludes Rithika.
