Artist to “Art Sick”: Sahu's Inner Creative Spirit

In contemporary art contexts, we often discuss creative forms, dramatic styles and market preferences, but rarely reach the most fundamental question: why do artists choose to create?

For artist Tikendra Kumar Sahu, the answer does not lie within a career choice, but rather in a deep internal necessity—a state he describes as being “art sick” and an Artistic Patient.

The Self-Diagnosis of the “Artistic Patient”

‘Artists are, in truth, “artistic patients”,’ Sahu defined his identity with this powerful metaphor during an in-depth conversation. This was not self-deprecation, but a profound self-observation. Within his philosophical context, ‘sickness’ is not a derogatory term, but rather an uncontrollable internal fullness and painfulness, an emotional and spiritual surge that has to find an outlet.

He explains: ‘When you are “ill”, you are bound; you must release your pain through painting.’ Thus, his canvases are never mere reproductions of observed landscapes or objects, but rather a surgery, a healing, a mirror that reflects his inner world.

Art as Reflective Existence

This perspective elevates Sahu's work beyond aesthetic and purely formative exploration. He believes that without the profound engagement of soul, spirit, and emotion, any artistic reflection becomes empty and illusory. For him, technique, style, and medium are just tools serving this inner expression— a boat for crossing the river, not the shore itself. His creative act is a necessary behaviour of his existence, an inevitable product of vitality and perception. 

Finding Resonance in Traces

When you stand before his works in watercolour, those layers upon layers of minute brushstrokes are not merely techniques for constructing form and colour. But also, they are visual traces of the artist's heartbeat and breath, an orderly arrangement of his “pathological” outpouring of sensibility. Each painting is a slice of his life, carrying the perceptions, emotions, and philosophical thoughts of a specific moment. Together, these dense brushstrokes form a distinctive visual texture, inviting us to read the density of time and emotion behind them.

To understand Sahu is to appreciate this sincerity that regards art as a living symbol. His work invites us to question: in our own existence, is there a kind of “illness” that must be expressed, that must be reflected?

Perhaps it is this universal, shared human internal drive that gives his paintings a power that transcends silence, providing a magnificent force that reaches straight into the audience’s heart.

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