Author: Ajmal

art color life

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There are visual treats that come with exploring unknown spaces. The slice of time from an early morning walk with the sun warming up the sky and the buildings gleaming in this vibrancy. Sometimes we get humbled by the privilege to experience this piece of art forming around you every day in a different hue.

Sunrise vibes at Muweilah, Sharjah

..“Art is unquestionably one of the purest and highest elements in human happiness. It trains the mind through the eye, and the eye through the mind. As the sun colors flowers, so does art color life.”

― John Lubbock,

Quoted from The Pleasures of Life

new storylines

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From an early morning trail. The rising sun is creating the perfect silhouette on the horizon.

Captured from Muweilah in Sharjah during a morning trail

“Part of what makes roads, trails and paths so unique as built structures is that they cannot be perceived as a whole all at once by a sedentary onlooker. They unfold in time as one travels along them, just as a story does as one listens or reads, and a hairpin turn is like a plot twist, a steep ascent a building of suspense to the view at the summit, a fork in the road an introduction of a new storyline, arrival the end of the story. Just as writing allows one to read the words of someone who is absent, so roads make it possible to trace the route of the absent. Roads are a record of those who have gone before and to follow them is to follow people who are no longer there…”

― Rebecca Solnit, Wanderlust

glances with intention

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..“The really magical things are the ones that happen right in front of you. A lot of the time you keep looking for beauty, but it is already there. And if you look with a bit more intention, you see it.”

― Vik Muniz

In fact, unraveling this same magic is what keeps our Ponder Series up and running. It’s my humble effort to explore beauty and purpose through awareness and intention. Photography and liberal arts are marvelous brushes to paint these themes.

Vibrant bougainvillea flowers at a wall outside Mamzar Beach Park

thoughts like footsteps

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This piece of illustrative art is inpired from a recent beach trail. Thoughts have always been perceived as an imprint. More so, thoughts transformed into a plan of action would have heavier footprints and would leave trails of fruits of labor.

..“The mist after rain, uninterrupted rainfall on rooftops, pitter-patter intellect. The thoughts I leave behind like footsteps.”

― Chris Campanioni, In Conversation
“…. The thoughts I leave behind like footsteps.”
Original fine art from The Border Of a Mind Studio

Explore more fine art : )

convergence of faculties

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This photograph would easily be one of my recent favorites in terms of framing. I was staying on a traffic lane and the car just stopped at this beautiful frame at the centre, as if this moment of click was to converge and fall in place like a click of a button or a tight latch. Although the overly done post-processing is off the roof, I just wanted it to be illuminated this way.

Convergence of Faculties, Photographed at Muweilah suburb in Sharjah Emirate, UAE, October 2020

“To photograph is to hold one’s breath when all faculties converge to capture fleeting reality. It’s at that precise moment that mastering an image becomes a great physical and intellectual joy.”

― Henri Cartier-Bresson, The Mind’s Eye: Writings on Photography and Photographers

lacuna

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Lacuna refers to an unfilled gap. I’m extending it to the scenario now wherein I’m back here in this space from a considerably long hiatus. I was actually moving my home to a different place and was rebooting myself as well. For me, I need that calmness and serenity to write/work on art-related stuff. The obvious chaos ensued from a house shift had to settle itself down. Netta and myself had been pondering a lot on moving to a new space. The earlier space that we’ve been living is an area that I’ve been in for around a decade or so. The new place is also in the periphery of the same area, but there’s a different vibe out here. Loving every aspect of it so far. This blog as it has been ever so still continues to be a book or a toolbox of intuition and spontaneity. This has been in chase of the mind wandering soul that I’m.

memories like desserts!

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Remember our culinary series? ‘Culinary Experiences’  is a series of visual stories that we started on our website for journaling some of our best ambrosial culinary experiences, be it the finest cordon bleu delights of a master chef or a cheesy experimental simmer at our little kitchen. We are trying to scribe it humbly here. This is not intended to be a recipe archive or a cookery show in case if you wondered. We’re only sharing the experience of trying and some of the art behind it.

The dessert below is called Chaina Ram Wala Ghewar. It’s a traditional Rajasthan style Ghevar (a Rajasthani cuisine ) served with berry rabdi on the top. (Rabdi or Rabri is a sweet, condensed-milk-based dish, originating from the Indian subcontinent ). We tried it from The Yellow Chilli by Sanjeev Kapoor.

Chaina Ram Wala Ghewar
“I am starting to think that maybe memories are like this dessert. I eat it, and it becomes a part of me, whether I remember it later or not.”
― Erica Bauermeister, The School of Essential Ingredients

how your story begins

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Tinkering edits with Pixlr. Not remembering where I photographed this from. Probably from Quilon, Kerala.

“Each day is born with a sunrise
and ends in a sunset, the same way we
open our eyes to see the light,
and close them to hear the dark.
You have no control over
how your story begins or ends.
But by now, you should know that
all things have an ending.
Every spark returns to darkness.
Every sound returns to silence.
And every flower returns to sleep
with the earth.
The journey of the sun
and moon is predictable
But yours,
is your ultimate
ART.”

― Suzy Kassem

the lab of dreams

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the lab

This work of art was inspired during a visit to Netta’s work laboratory in a university in Dubai. Although I worked on it pretty in the instant, I liked the way it turned out. From the colors and shades of the equipment to the stickers around to vibrant tones of chemicals around, it all set that mood to instigate a creative fervor. Notice the DNA shades on my tees as well. Now, this is a frame that was bound to happen right down to its finest details. I’d like to correlate this theme with something else.

Today I was listening to a generic talk and the speaker was gently enunciating that what we physically work on or dream initially forms as an abstract in our mind. Any material object that we procure or any project that we pursue would first form in our minds. So, he was saying that in order to chase dreams, first sculpt them in our minds with a deep passion and to try our best to draw in an action plan to chase it. Very interesting. Our mind is the lab of our dreams If we philosophically postulate an extension for this artwork. God bless.