Artist

Maanas Udayakumar

Chennai · Bangalore

Ashvita's

Biography

Maanas Udayakumar is a Bengaluru-based abstract figurative artist whose work emerges from deeply personal experiences, touching on themes of love, loss, memory, and mental health. His practice revolves around an emotional and intuitive exploration of form—especially the human figure—alongside recurring motifs drawn from flora and fauna. Rather than engaging with direct narrative, Maanas treats memory as shape and sensation, creating compositions that are both sparse and charged with feeling. Working primarily in monochrome using emulsion or wall paints, his minimalist surfaces evoke a sense of quiet intensity. Over time, his visual language has expanded to include plants, guppy fish, cats, dogs, mathematical tools, and lotus stems—each rendered from unconventional perspectives. Even his signature, often placed visibly within the composition, becomes a visual element and part of the artwork’s structure. Maanas discovered his distinctive style during his postgraduate studies at the Tamil Nadu Music and Fine Arts University. Though initially uncertain about his direction, he was significantly influenced by artist and professor Ezhumalai Ezhilarasan, whose commitment to daily artistic practice, grounded teaching style, and philosophical approach to life left a lasting impression. It was during this period that Maanas began working with emulsion paint—a medium that offered immediacy and freedom, in contrast to the slower drying times of acrylics. This shift enabled him to respond directly to emotional impulses, working with a spontaneity that soon became central to his practice. His early works often reflected moments of emotional turbulence—marked by personal struggles such as breakups, depression, and recurring images of roadkill, all of which became symbolic within his visual world. Each work is created in a short burst of intense focus—typically within 10 to 20 minutes—without preparatory sketches or changes in brushes. This swift, almost meditative mode of working allows his paintings to function as emotional imprints: immediate, raw, and unresolved. Today, while continuing to work on small-scale formats, Maanas is gradually expanding his practice to include larger canvases. Despite the shift in scale, he remains committed to the sense of directness and vulnerability that defines his art—using minimalism not as a stylistic choice, but as a strategy for emotional precision.

Selected Works