Babitha Rajiv’s painting exhibition in Thiruvananthapuram depicts various kinds of desire

‘The Quest for Blue Flower’, an exhibition of 37 paintings, has been done in different media

Babitha Rajiv wants the viewers to interpret her paintings. Even if the interpretations are far removed from what she has tried to convey, she has no complaints. “Once I finish a work, I don’t have an authority over it and it ceases to be my idea,” says Babitha.

The Kochi-based artist’s exhibition, ‘The Quest for Blue Flower’, is currently on at Vyloppilly Samskrithi Bhavan in Thiruvananthapuram. This is her fifth solo exhibition and it showcases 37 paintings in different media. There are works in acrylics, pen, pencil and charcoal.

“All of us have desires, some gets fulfilled. But, most of us would have unfulfilled desires too, which we keep trying to attain, knowing fully well that they would never materialise. Yet, we keep aspiring for it. The path we choose or the efforts we take to get there and the disappointment over not attaining them have been conveyed through these paintings. The colour blue stands for human desire,” explains the artist.

Babitha adds that but for a couple of paintings, she has kept the theme gender neutral.

As in her previous exhibitions, Babitha says that she did some research before working on the theme. “I asked a few of my friends and family members about their desires. I heard things like ‘I want to be the Indian President!’ Then there is this friend who loves someone she can’t ever be with. Another person told me that her desire is to sleep peacefully at least for a day. I am the secret-keeper of my friends and family because they trust me. A few of those secret wishes have inspired some of these paintings,” she says. She has also put in a few of her desires. “I won’t reveal that!” she laughs.

The frames also touch upon the mind, its complexities and vulnerabilities. For example, in one of the untitled works in charcoal and acrylic, two interwined forms, looking like skeletons, are shown extracting each others’ hearts in such a way that it breaks all romantic notions about love. “I know it is a wild take on that feeling. But that is what happens in love, right? Once you start a relationship, possessiveness seeps in,” she explains.

Another work, a set of three in acrylic, ruminates upon the universal phenomenon that ‘The grass is always greener on the other side’. She has featured zebras in these paintings, which she says are one of her favourite animals. “In my last exhibition, ‘613 seeds’, zebras were an important component. This set is the first work I did after that exhibition and zebras came in as a continuation of that event,” she says.