Ep4 - Painting Like an Engineer with Uma K
I am fascinated by people who make art but are not otherwise trained or full-time artists. The hobbyist, or enthusiast, is in many ways more interesting than the dedicated artist. Their reasons to make art are not as ordinary as natural talent or as boring as childhood skill. It is a conscious decision to invest precious leisure time. They often have strong, clear motivations for doing so.
Today I’m speaking with an urban sketcher whose work I have admired for a long time. She makes amazing watercolors, and draws and paints not only on location, but also out of her own garage-studio. Uma works with both brush and stylus. Her brush strokes look effortless, and she conveys a lot of meaning without getting overwhelmed by details. She works as an engineer in Silicon Valley, so I wonder how she finds the time to paint so much. I am fascinated by people who choose to give their precious leisure time to artistic pursuit. Join me in learning the role that art plays in her life and Uma paints like an engineer.
Below is a summarized transcript of our conversation.
Transcript
02:27 Nishant: What does it mean to “paint like an engineer”?
Uma explains the resistance she displays behind the slogan, to combat stigma as a female engineer who is interested in art.
But also cross-pollination of skills...
The other meaning behind the term is the habit of applying a scientific problem-solving technique to the activity of being an artist…“to set intermediate goals to measure her success and not get stuck in an infinite loop.”
Uma explains the art/science of debugging her art
06:40 Uma talks about growing up in Pune and drawing as a teenager among professional students. Nishant on being process driven as children instead of results-driven.
10:20 Uma on her engineering education background, finding ‘elegance’ in circuit design at Stanford.
(on why she needed to make art)
“I thought I was becoming a really bitter person, and I had to do something to become better. I had to indulge in some selfish activity to satisfy me. And if I was happy, I could become a better parent.”
Uma on the need for community, and how Flickr was useful for her to find others. Nishant talks about early Internet.
Uma talks about finding the USk community, sharing the joys with each other, and getting the “licence to draw anywhere”.
16:41 Uma’s feedback loop
“Everything starts with curiosity…” Uma explains how to break down a full painting to its parts, then making a plan to complete it.
Nishant delves deeper into the pyramid of learning, and Uma’s house of cards illustration.
The step of connecting across skills in different media. Uma talks about different things that help people improve, in her experience.
Nishant talks about control engg and black-box system identification. Uma on research-based education - something that “feeds the curiosity” and “gives dignity to people by letting them come up with solutions”.
25:40 Nishant talks about being an artist in the US vs India. Concepts of artist v artisan in India. Ease of doing business in the US as a young artist.
30:45 Uma talks about how she picked up an iPad in 2017.
Nishant ties digital USk to the pyramid of skill-building
34:04 (on advantage of digital medium)
“Digital medium gave me something that watercolor wouldn’t… An easy (and faster) way to put textures… I don’t have to wait for things to dry… sometimes errors happen, and digital gives me one more chance to fix things that watercolors don’t.”
Uma on getting students to try the iPad in a pedantic approach … taking them step-by-step.
Nishant explains how timelapse videos can be used. “For a complex work, at different times, they will watch the video to trace their steps.”
Uma sticks up for Indian education and checks our generational privilege
Nishant on how art is understood differently in different places. What is the relationship that Indians have with art? Conversation about why Indians don’t seem to want original art as much.
47:00 What is one good reason for a non-artist to practice drawing from location?
“There are no non-artists, we are all researchers. Urban-sketching … allows you to connect with your environment... When you sit in one place and experience the smells, the wind, the sounds, you understand more of your locality … you actually understand that people are the same…Somehow an artist, painting, is very safe. People will talk around you... Because you show interest in other people’s lives, it is usually rewarded with reverse curiosity. People will come and share their stories... There is a gratifying experience when you connect one soul to another, just by the mere act of being there with open curiosity.”
06:40
Thank you!
Thank you for joining me in this conversation with Uma Kelkar. I learned a lot of great things.
One thing that stood out was the unique way Uma uses the iPad and Procreate app.
The digital medium is so deeply customizable now that different styles of artists can express themselves in ways that they are most comfortable. Technology has democratized the work of making art, and inspiration is everywhere you look. Uma has her own workflow with the iPad and it’s very interesting for me to hear how that works.
Follow Uma’s work on Instagram, or find her website at www.umakelkar.com.
If you’re still reading this, I want to thank you for staying with me on this podcast. You are great. Join me in the next episode for a conversation with Donald Owen Colley, who I am pleased to say is a good friend that I have drawn with many times. Everytime we see each other, we talk about everything and this episode is also a little bit like that. I ask him about the ways in which he finds character and beauty in his urban surroundings, while not shying away from the ugly aspects of our world.
As always, I would love to hear what you think of this podcast, and if you have any questions and suggestions for me.
I share my thoughts about the podcast and my own work (#SneakyArt) on my weekly newsletter. I spoke about this episode in Issue #12. Take a look and consider subscribing!