I was born in Karaikudi, I was there till my 4th standard before we moved to this magical city called Chennai. Chennai on a whole will have a lot of mixed culture but if you take North Chennai specifically if will have the native Chennai people. When we moved into the city to North Chennai, places like Royapuram, Kasimedu, Tondaiarpet and people there are the origin people of the city. Since I was brought up with the natives, it completely took off the Karaikudi identity and made me feel I am a pucca Chennaite.

Chennai Na beaches, of course you can never miss the Marina and Elliot’s. And the city is also home for some amazing temples, the Kapaleeshwarar temple in Mylapore, Parthasarathy temple in Triplicane, Kaligambal Temple in Paris and since I am from North Chennai which is home to the Thiruvottiyur Vadivudai Amman Temple. When it comes to food Chennai is a perfect place to explore cuisines not just from other parts of Tamil Nadu but from across the world. Since it’s a place that hosts people from across the world here is no dearth in variety of cuisines available in the city. Be it Rayar’s Mess, Karpagambal Mess, Moon Rakers in Mahabalipuram; new concepts and cuisines keep coming to the city. People ask for your favorite spot in the city, but with the options the city has my favorite spot keeps changing every day.

My mom used to tell me I was a bright student when I was in Karaikudi, but after coming to Chennai my interest shifted from academics to art, I took up painting seriously for a career. When I was in my 9th standard my painting won the second place in the Indian festival USSR that’s one of the unforgettable moments in my life. Since I had set my mind to become an artist when I was in school, I tried to get into the college of arts and for various reasons I didn’t get a seat that year. The college asked me to wait for a year, but out of anger I ditched the idea to join college and started my career then. Since then, the city has played a major role in shaping my career and today I am proud to be identified as a self-taught artist.

With the penetration of social media which connected clients and artists directly, this kind of brought down the grace for one man art exhibitions. When we were thinking to revive the interest in art among people, a Korean company started museum with a new concept called Trick-eye Museum. After visiting similar museums abroad, I finally created the click art 3D museum in Chennai, following which we created 19 similar museums in India and Singapore. When it comes to 3D art there is a space for the audience in the painting, unlike normal painting where audience can just view it in 3D painting public can be a part of it by clicking pictures along with it, that made it a big hit.

As an artist I envy the change the city has gone through and have been going through consistently, I have seen the OMR and ECR of those days before the IT boom, I have seen empty roads with no big building in OMR. While I see the city changing on one side, another amazing aspect of the city is the way it preserves its history. 

If I have to dedicate one color to Chennai I would say the Brick Red, the reason behind since I came to into this great city all that I saw and admired be it the Egmore Railway station, Presidency college, Central railway station everything was in that reddish shade. In fact, the brick red was the dominating shade of North Chennai too.

I have done around 72 art exhibitions worldwide; the best and most unforgettable ones have happened to me only in Chennai. My first art show in the city happened in 1987 in Chola Sheraton, in 2007 I did an exhibition titled “Zakir in my dreams” on table artist Zakir Hussain launched by the man himself in Chennai which got accolades Nationally. Similarly, my exhibition on Mont Blanc paintings, one on Mahatma Gandhiji tracing his life in 20 paintings in Raj Bhavan inaugurated by then Governor Shri, Surjit Singh Burnala and actor Vijay, 10 Legends of Carnatic music exhibitions for Margazhi festival at Taj, my worldwide Camera Collections inaugurated by Kamal Haasan. And the museums that I created in Chennai were the 3D art museum, worlds first Silicon Museum, Asia’s biggest camera museum that was inaugurated by PC Sreeram to name a few. All this finally led to when people from History channel wanted to profile me for their “Oh My God” show. The team came town to Chennai and was here for three days to do a documentary and at the end they called me the Museum man of India which for me is unforgettable. From coming to this city as a kid, not good at academics, took art as a career and finally to look back today the kind of work that I was able to do, I owe to Chennai for shaping me at each and every stage of my career. 

If you take Chennai, it’s a perfect sangamam of people from different parts of the state and country and in fact after industry boom, I will say different parts of the world, Chennai has introduced me to painters from different parts of the world that led to a lot of cross learning and helped be upgrade my skills as an artist, I owe a lot to Chennai for this exposure. For me you can see and explore the world sitting in Chennai such is the diversity and inclusivity of the city.